Let’s Fight for a system that values all workers here ♦ Rulers Create Homelessness here ♦ 
For Capitalists, Bus Drivers and Unhoused People are Expendable. Let’s Fight for a System Where All Workers Are Valued
LOS ANGELES (USA), July 8— “They ain’t gonna do shit! They don’t care about us. They don’t care if we get killed! Mayor Karen Bass is a liar! They aren’t going to do anything about the homeless. They spend money that’s supposed to help the homeless on themselves!” said an angry MTA (public transit) bus driver.
“They’re killing us!” said another driver.
“It’s the whole capitalist system,” a comrade said.
“Yeah. It’s the system,” the driver agreed.
MTA drivers are worried and furious. For the last few months, at least one driver each month has been attacked (some stabbed) by a passenger. Usually a mentally ill unhoused passenger. One driver is in critical condition after being stabbed on the bus.
LA Mayor Karen Bass promised to solve the homeless crisis but has accomplished nothing. Homelessness here has climbed from 42,000 in 2022, when she was elected, to over 46,000 today. Unhoused riders are angry at the system that has abandoned them. Some mistakenly target and attack the drivers.
The rulers want drivers and passengers to blame each other. But the capitalist system, including MTA, is to blame!
Homelessness is built into capitalism. If we can’t produce profits for them, the capitalists won’t hire us. Without a job (wage slavery), there’s no wage (money). If you don’t have the money – no matter how much you need something – you can’t have the house, the food, clothes, or medicine.
In the 1980s, many US public mental institutions were closed. They dumped hundreds of thousands of mentally ill patients on the streets. For the capitalists, unemployed and mentally ill people are expendable. So are all workers.
Today, US rulers spend $billions on Israel’s genocide in Gaza and war in Ukraine. Politicians don’t build hospitals for the mentally ill or use the 16 million boarded-up houses that are rotting in the US today to house homeless people. Instead, they encourage them to ride MTA buses all day.
Cops Are Not Our Friends
When drivers are attacked, they call MTA for help. They get none. When they call the cops, they take an hour and a half to get there. The only protection drivers have is a flimsy piece of plastic. But they don’t want the LA Police Department on the buses.
“MTA talked about putting plain clothes cops on the buses. We don’t want that either,” said a driver. “But it would be good if the cops were around outside the buses and could come immediately when needed.”
“The cops serve and protect the private property of the rich, not us,”
answered the comrade. “When families call 911 for a relative who is having a mental health issue, the cops often shoot that relative or another family member.”
MTA just announced plans to form a new MTA security force. But they say it will take them five years to train! They said the same thing fifteen years ago, but it never happened.
Instead of relying on the bosses’ racist cops, drivers need solidarity and unity with other drivers and regular riders to collectively keep the buses as safe as possible while fighting for a system that meets our needs.
The only way to have security is to end wage slavery and the genocidal rule of money with communist revolution. In communism, everything, including transit, will be free. Nothing will be bought or sold. Everything will be produced and distributed only to meet workers’ needs, based on comradely relations, not money.
Mass transit will be safe, clean and plentiful. Many will help transport our class wherever we need to go. Without profit or bosses, society will guarantee the safety and health of transit and all workers.
No one will be unhoused or unemployed. There will be needed work and housing for everyone. Our collectivity, brains and labor are all we need to get to live dignified, creative and productive lives.
Communism is Humanity’s Future. Let’s Fight for It!
More drivers are reading Red Flag. ICWP invites them, and all readers, to join the fight for the system where no worker will be treated as expendable garbage. Where everyone will contribute what they can and receive what they need.
As the dollar loses value, as the rulers spend more on weapons to murder workers in Gaza, Ukraine, and Russia, and prepare for World War III, our situation will get worse. There will be massive rebellions. MTA workers who have been reading Red Flag for years can give communist leadership to the whole working class, including soldiers.
Workers can organize strikes and work stoppages against racist capitalism that makes more people homeless, puts drivers in danger, and wages genocidal wars for profit. Only communism can end these attacks. MTA workers can help organize revolution and communist society. Join us!
Read Our Pamphlet: “Mobilize the Masses for Communism” here
Capitalist Rulers Create Homelessness and Unemployment
MTA drivers are worried. They have grown accustomed to all sorts of issues with passengers. But in the last few months there has been an increase in extreme violence against bus operators. At this moment, a few operators are out of work because they are still recuperating from aggravated assault and one operator who is barely alive. We are not sure that he is going to survive.
The USA has the highest percentage of rich people per capita in the world. Does it make you wonder why most of the workers are struggling to make ends meet? There is enough money to basically create anything, and yet the main idea of capitalism is to scare us into believing that we are not entitled to even our basic human needs.
Everyone could be employed if the government and big business wanted to. But no; it’s best for them to create scarcity. Thereby having us stress all the time. An unchecked stress issue can turn into a mental problem.
In the 1980s, then-president Ronald Reagan cut government costs by eliminating mental health assistance for most workers and veterans. He closed mental institutions. The weather and other state governments helped create growing issues of homelessness in Los Angeles as we know it today.
Just think for a moment how smart is the Supreme Court, the “think tank” of our society that just made homelessness illegal.
Most of the out of state homeless are in tropical LA weather because they want to survive. The government agencies of those states do not want people who cannot work. Or just because they are different. A lot of them are not able to deal with the cost of living in California and end up on the street.
Capitalism creates homelessness and tries to brainwash us into believing that it is the individual’s fault.
—A retired Los Angeles MTA Driver