Zbigniew Brzezinski, a former national security advisor, has warnedthat the US could witness riots if economy continues its downwardspiral.
“There’s going to be growing conflict between theclasses and if people are unemployed and really hurting, hell, therecould be even riots!” said Brzezinski, President Jimmy Carter’snational security advisor, in a recent interview with NBC.
“In1907, when we had a massive banking crisis, when banks were beginningto collapse, there were going to be riots in the streets,” he added.
Atleast 3.6 million jobs have been wiped out throughout the US since therecession began in December 2007. The jobless rate officially reached a16-year high of 7.6% (11.6 million people) last month.
Earlierthis week, a new Federal Reserve report said that US unemployment couldincrease to 8.8%, causing the economy to contract for a full calendaryear for the first time since 1991, when a contraction of 0.2% wasregistered.
The Obama White House has put forward an array ofmeasures, including a $787 billion stimulus package, in the hopes ofreviving the flagging economy.
Brzezinski, meanwhile, made some recommendations to the young administration. He proposed the creation of a voluntary national solidarity fund, whosecontributors would be those who became wealthy in recent times.
“Whereis the moneyed class today? Why aren’t they doing something: the peoplewho made billions, millions. I’m sort of thinking of Paulson, of Rubin[former treasury secretaries]. Why don’t they get together, and whydon’t they organize a national solidarity fund in which they call onall of those who made these extraordinary amounts of money to kick someback?” he argued. (He is kidding, right? — Ed.)
“I was worrying about it because we’re goingto have millions and millions of unemployed, people really facing direstraits. And we’re going to be having that for some period of timebefore things hopefully improve,” said Brzezinski.