Of inequality, cold showers, and how we value other people's sacrifices
Why am I writing this?
The original version if this text was published in Spanish on January 14, 2024 under the title “Introducción”.
January 14, 2024
Panama City, R.P.
From the time I was born in the early 1980’s, until I left for college in the States in 2000, about 4 or 5 women worked and lived with my family and I as domestic workers (the word nanny doesn’t quite do it justice, but it’s the closest thing to nana I can think of). As far as I can remember, all but one were people of the highest human quality.
The one who made the most profound impression in my life, largely because she spent the most time with us, was Mimi, whose real name shall remain undisclosed out of respect for her privacy. If it were up to me, though, in every room in my family’s home, and even above all our respective beds, we’d have a portrait of Mimi smiling down at us, much like the most fervent Chavistas still hang their dear leader on the wall, for I honestly cannot imagine what would have become of my family without this woman.
Think I’m exaggerating?
In addition to raising my sister and me (along with, naturally, our parents and teachers), and often being the glue that prevented us from falling apart under the many pressures that at times accumulate atop Panamanian families, Mimi also moved in with my sister years later when, after getting married and having children of her own, she asked Mimi for help.
Even as the grandmother of a child whose mom worked full-time, Mimi agreed to move in with my sister, thus significantly contributing to the wellbeing of a third generation of my family. Believe me when I tell you, then, that even from a purely economic standpoint, no one generated more utility, no person created more value—day after day, paycheck after paycheck, over more years—than Mimi.
However, Mimi’s contributions came at a great personal sacrifice, perhaps the greatest any mother can make. To be able to provide a decent life for her daughters, ironically, Mimi had to put aside her own maternal duties.
A couple of years after graduating into single motherhood at the tender age of 19, Mimi, who hailed from a small town in the border province of Chiriquí (over 300 miles from Panama City), made the tough decision—not quite “Sophie’s Choice”, but damn—to leave her home, her people, her entire life, for a job as a nanny in the capital. This meant cleaning, cooking, and essentially playing the role of third parent to two children who were not her own, while Mimi’s daughters could see their mom just a couple of times a year.
By the way, this is a reality faced by thousands of young Panamanian women—girls, if we’re being honest—most of whom are never told that raising children, while it may very well be a blessing, is nonetheless a tough, thankless, full-time job that no one in Panama will pay you to do for your own.
Now, as many would say, why did they get pregnant in the first place?, but our society’s message to Mimi, and to so many other immature, vulnerable girls like she was then, wholly ignorant to the physical, emotional, and economic burdens that come with bringing another person into this world—or, to be more exact, into this highly unequal country—is this: we’ll pay you to raise children, it’s the most important job of all! Just not your kids, though, sorry.
Furthermore, Mimi was actually pretty “lucky” to end up in a household like ours, where she slept well, ate deliciously, and, technically, we couldn’t ask anything of her on Sundays. The horror stories of Panamanian families treating their domestic workers like animals were well known to Mimi, as to most of my friends’ nannies.
Another “break” Mimi got was that her mother could still take care of her daughters for her—and still wanted to, ‘cause at that age people wanna rest a bit, ya know?
So imagine my shock—having at least some understanding by age 18 of the sacrifice Mimi had made to come work for us—when I learned that, just like the majority of the residential buildings constructed during Panama’s real estate boom in the ’70s and ’80s, mine also lacked hot water in the servants’ bathroom.
In short, Mimi, my nanny and second mother, one of the people who most positively affected my life through sheer personal sacrifice, who always knew where my socks and shirts were and who would lend me 2 bucks to take a taxi to a basketball game, the woman who cooked for me, cleaned for me, picked up after me, and basically took care of me for much of my life, the one who literally saved me from countless worries, both trivial and existential, for which I will never be able to fully express my gratitude; this woman, in all the years she was with us, would never take a single hot shower in our home.
Not. A. One.
She was with us for over 15 yeas, btw…
And it’s not as if taking cold showers every day is some kind of punishment, but she didn’t even have the option, ya know? Despite all the the high-tech amenities featured in residential skyscrapers like mine, the first inklings of the Panama City skyline we see today: swimming pool, jacuzzi, state-of-the-art elevators, even a freakin water fountain in the lobby; for the vast majority of the women who end up living in our “maid’s quarters”—i.e. the people who actually raise our children, sometimes on their own—there never seems to be much money.
WTF?
To answer this question, I am launching Versión Criolla. How is it, for example, that someone so essential, to both my parents as well as my sister and I, shared a home with us in which every bathroom had hot water except hers?
How is it that so many Panamanians, in order to be (relatively) well-compensated and, thus, provide a better life for their children than the one they had, must quite literally quit raising them to go, usually very far from home, to raise someone else’s kids, or whatever it is that may provide a decent life?
And how come we don’t even bother to provide hot water for a person who, at the end of the day, bears the greatest responsibility of all: caring for the child during the key stages of its physical and socio-emotional development?
This episode, and so many others like it, reflects a glaring inconsistency between the sacrifices and efforts of thousands of Panamanians like Mimi, on the one hand, and their compensation in the labor market, on the other. It reveals a hypocritical disconnect between the values our society claims to uphold—being a parent is the most important job of all—and how, as a country, we allocate our limited resources (spoiler alert: we mostly sink them into highly questionable yet extremely profitable real estate development, rather than in investments of real socioeconomic impact).
Meanwhile, Panama ranks prominently at the bottom of every list that matters: educational attainment, labor productivity, and, therefore, social mobility. Sadly, we even have to allow multinationals to bring in their own workforce, because Panama does not produce enough skilled workers.
How come?
Well, historically, no one with political or economic power in Panama—effectively the same thing in a weak and corruptible State like ours—has ever cared about education, neither that of citizens nor of consumers, who are effectively forced to buy inferior products at inflated prices.
As much as some local politicians, as well as the CEO’s of the country’s most profitable companies, proclaim ad nauseam their support for top-tier public education, unfortunately, it has never featured prominently in the agenda of any union, trade group, or political party. This has to do with historical and even geographical legacies that no one alive today created alone—nor that anyone alone could change.
Yeah, but why?
Well, the answer to this is multifaceted, meaning several factors influence the outcome. On one side of the spectrum—of who actually has to bust their butt working and who, let's say, not so much—are the economic, political, and social systems that govern our lives.
Hidden in plain sight, these systems define the playing field and thus have a massive influence on the structure of Panamanian society, as well as the opportunities—or lack thereof—to ascend its strata (basically, what we all want: for our children to have a better life than ours). Putting it plainly, these systems determine who wins and who loses in Panama.
For example, do you know who writes the laws, i.e., the rules of the game, and what they demand in return? Do you know who has permission or—key in Panama—incentive to play, i.e., to profit, and who does not? Do you know who gets first dibs, i.e., who has privileged access to the State’s resources—both natural, such as its land, airspace, and whatever lies beneath its soil; as well as social, specifically, its laws and infrastructure?
Understanding these questions is crucial to make sense, not only of why Panama is becoming unstable, even dramatically so, today, but also what the hell have we been doing decade after decade, administration after administration, to have reached this point, seemingly, of no return.
Do you know how State assets are exploited and who is allowed to do so? Do you know how the value extracted from these assets is distributed? And so on…
On the other side of this spectrum lies human psychology. For the purposes of this substack, it doesn’t matter if you believe we were shaped by a supreme being or by evolutionary processes; the reality is that our bodies and brains were “designed” for an environment vastly different from the one we currently inhabit. Our reality, far more than we realize, is determined by the meatsuit we wear—i.e. our biology—including our brain and how it processes sensory stimuli.
Imagine, then, if we mostly ignore the previously described systems, and their influence on us, how often do we even think about the impact our bodies have on what we think, believe, and even know. As the saying goes: we don’t see things as they are, we see things as we are. I would argue, even more arbitrarily, we see things through whatever fleeting emotional state we’re in at the moment, as anyone who’s ever had to apologize for what they did when they were hangry can attest to.
Versión Criolla: Our instincts for survival and reproduction, ancient forces deeply embedded within us, are almost always the ones making the decisions that feel ours. Although we like to think we’re rational, the reality is that, more often than not, action precedes thought; that is, we use reason more to rationalize our impulses and emotions than to arrive at some kind of objective truth.
How else, for example, could my parents—both exemplary human beings with big hearts and a keen social awareness—come to terms with the fact that the person on whom their children’s well-being (and therefore their peace of mind) depended the most, had to wake up to ungodly cold water every single morning?
The problem is that it’s simply too easy to wash our hands with: “ay, poor nanny, but what else can we do? That’s how all new apartments are built these days. These goddam developers do whatever they want, I swear, someone should pass a law! But go on, honey, sign the contract, it’s a good deal and interest rates are going up as we speak!
What I hope to achieve
Versión Criolla is a weekly newsletter, mostly about public policy in Panama, that will arrive in your inbox upon subscription. It’s free for now, but in the future readers will have the option to contribute monthly or annually to make the endeavor sustainable. My goals are threefold:
To explain complex processes, be they political, economic, social, etc., that may be overwhelming for the general public. Mind you, they are for me too, but I’m a nerd and delve into these topics for pleasure. (However, I also seek to be compensated for the effort; after all, there’s a reason we have “chosen” this economic system based on self-interest to generate wealth and thrive as a species: because when markets are truly free and competitive—the exception in Panama, not the rule—they can be miraculous.
To analyze the (borderline unhinged) state of the nation in order to a) determine its causes, particularly the role played in the final outcome by the pieces, the board, and the rules of the game. Beyond context, I want to explore the meaning—and consequences—of what happens in Panamá, to then b) suggest public policies that may improve the situation.
To raise awareness and take political action on the most pressing problems facing us, which are existential, as any Latin American who has had to moved to Panama in the past couple of decades can tell you—of every ten migrants here, at least eight, I assure you, did not come for the weather nor our welcoming disposition towards foreigners, even tourists; they came because their own countries went to hell in a hand basket and, in Panama, at least for now, there’s still money to be made. My diagnosis of the disease and, therefore, the prescription (Rx), are roughly related to the following:
Panama, a small country with key resources for the global economy and a relatively homogenous population—except, as we will see, in socioeconomic terms—suffers from egregious levels of inequality, which becomes more entrenched by the day.
This is evident, not only in the protests that erupted after the now-void but then rage-inducing mining contract was signed by the Gobiernito (the current administration), but also in the social resentment and widespread discontent amongst the population toward their rulers, but also toward their fellow Panamanians, those from this or that other group.
Just FYI, Panama is practically the most unequal country in Latin America, already the most unequal region of the world: we’re technically tied with Brazil, where millions live and die in the underworld of the favela; and El Salvador, where the fool in power prefers to hand over the country to Google—and have a huge chunk of the population slog to the United States—rather than seriously try to improve their lives.
This inequality—especially in terms of income and wealth, i.e., the economic outcomes of our public policies—causes social resentment and, for reasons we will also explore in this space, political instability.
Therefore, today more than ever, we need a broad and robust middle class that lobbies for public policies aligned with the interests of, on the one hand, formal wage-earners and, on the other, entrepreneurs / small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Specifically, we must fight to:
Significantly improve how labor is remunerated (and, more importantly, taxed)—including the most important labor of all: raising children—as well as to broaden access to at-cost, long-term credit for SME’s
Reduce the burden of State financing that currently falls on formal wage earners and SMEs—a sheer atrocity—and transfer it to landlords (including myself, if I’m being generous) and large conglomerates operating in the country, both domestic and foreign, especially if they profit from the exploitation of national resources, including monopolistic concessions, direct subsidies, and special tax incentives.
This will be part of a political/civil society project, which I will talk about in the coming weeks, that aims to organize Panama’s entrepreneurs and wage earners to fight, together and strategically, for policies that improve the quality of life for both groups, which are currently taxed punitively—by both government and private enterprise—thanks to a State which has been captured by, among other special interests, trade unions and large corporations.
Wanna help?
Illuminating our world to better understand it, especially in times of fear and confusion, is crucial. The closer we get to a shared reality, the more we can live, in these complex times, in a healthier and more humane way. But as citizens of a democracy, we also have the responsibility to participate civically, or as we might say, to do our part for our country, every day.
This doesn’t just mean being a well-informed citizen of the republic, or res publica—a necessary but not sufficient condition—but also promoting policies that ensure the wellbeing of the vast majority of Panamanians, especially those who sacrifice day in and day out to get ahead, yet receive less and less in return for their efforts.
For this reason, with Versión Criolla, I will also attempt to define what wellbeing means for the vast majority of Panamanians, however impossible the task may seem. To let “the market” define it, as we supposedly have until now, is to let those with the most money impose the rules, and that is exactly what has us stuck in the gravitational pull of this sociopolitical black hole, from which we have no clear way out.
At the very least, it must be said, we are intimately familiar with our main national issues: 1) poverty and lack of social mobility; 2) economic inequality, which has metastasized into the political and social spheres; and 3) corruption, both from State institutions and the politicians who run them, as well as from large corporate conglomerates, most of which use their considerable financial resources, not necessarily to compete by offering a better product at a lower price, but to capture the State and extract value from it.
Also, thanks to the social sciences, including what we once (very wisely) called political economy, we have a wealth of historical data and analytical studies that show us pretty clearly what works, and what definitely does not.
We also have the results, some clearer than others, of the public policies that have been implemented—or imposed—throughout history, both in Panama and in the region.
From the import-substitution industrialization (ISI) of post-World War II developmentalist / populist regimes, such as those of Perón in Argentina, Vargas in Brazil, and, to a certain extent, Torrijos here at home; to the Washington Consensus of the 21st century, a set of what most would call “neoliberal” reforms that, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, were unleashed on the newly democratic Latin American republics—and happily implemented by most of the regional governments at the time.
The effects of these policies run the gamut, from the failed-state catastrophe known as the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, to the more or less sustainable development of the welfare state in the Eastern Republic of Uruguay.
Raison d’etre
My greatest wish is that this space fosters critical thinking, an exchange of ideas, and, if all goes well, constructive debate. I want to clarify issues that may seem boring or complicated at first glance but that we can—and must—understand better in order to manage them more easily, especially if we examine them with patience, reliable information, and “objective” analysis (in quotes, ‘cause pure objectivity does not exist in the real world; however, it remains a good target at which to aim).
I’ll express myself clearly but fairly, with no intention to offend anyone and always open to the possibility of being completely and utterly wrong, in order to learn and thus become a better citizen, because that is the only way.
More than anything, however, I want to prevent Panama from falling into the same trap as Venezuela fell into, that of a country that was rich—by sheer geological accident, just like us—yet deeply unequal; instead of following the path of Uruguay, for example, a small country whose main interest groups, through a frustrating and imperfect democracy, have managed to live in relative peace and prosperity, instead of ready to see the country burn before having the other group prosper, and without openly resenting so many of their compatriots (as happens today in Panama, make no mistake).
This is no way to live, and we will not last long as a republic, let alone a democratic one, if we don’t change course, slowly but surely, before a populist finishes destroying what Providence, or the randomness of the universe, has bequeathed the nearly 5 million souls who share this wholly unique resource in the planet.
I hope it serves you well.
Sincerely,
-Andres