"To Capitalist Folly, Town in Spain Offers Reply"

[white_wolf]

This article is from 2009,but I still thought it was interesting. It is about a "communist" town in Spain. The full article is from the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/24/world/europe/24iht-spain.html

While the rest of Spain gorged on cheap credit to buy overpriced homes, the people of Marinaleda were building their own houses, mortgage-free, under the town hall’s scheme, Mr. Sánchez said. When a villager loses his job, the cooperative hires him, he said, so nobody in the village wants for work — a bold claim in a region with 21 percent unemployment.

Vanessa Romero, who moved from Barcelona to Marinaleda in January with her family, said she was drawn by the promise of work and the municipal facilities. In November, she lost her job at a sugar factory and her husband was struggling to find construction work; now they each make about €1,100 a month working for the cooperative, about $1,450.

“If a town like this, with half the resources of other towns, or less, can provide work for people, why can’t other places do the same?” said Ms. Romero, whose parents were born in the village.