Would you fight for your right to keep your job? Well, as reported by Dexerto, it looks like this mindset extends to clowns. They have taken to the streets (presumably not in clown cars) in Bolivia's capital, La Paz, to protest a new law that effectively cuts their working hours.
A mandate from the Bolivian Ministry of Education has said that schools must hold lessons for 200 days each years, no exceptions. And President Rodrigo Paz added that cultural days and parties cannot take place on these days. He said that these celebrations should be shifted to weekends.
So, what does this mean for the clowns? Well, they're typically hired for parties and other fun events. So, when parties are outlawed on weekends, they're basically taking a massive hours cut and a pay cut to boot.
Wilder Ramirez, the leader of a clown union, said that this decree doesn't just affect clowns. He said it "will economically affect all of us who work with children", adding that "children need to laugh".
So, the clowns have flooded La Paz to demand that the decree be reversed. I don't blame them—I wouldn't like having my job be undermined.
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Bolivia Is Facing Its Worst Economic Crisis in Decades
But, this isn't just about clowns and photographers. This news comes as one of the worst economic crises in decades looms over the livelihoods of millions in Bolivia. As reported by the Associated Press News, the crisis can be represented and seen in a pretty sad way - bread.
"Battle bread", or pan de batalla, originally got its name from troops' rations in the war against Paraguay in the 1930s. Bread has a fixed price in Bolivia thanks to government intervention. But what it doesn't have is a fixed weight.
So, as inflation shrunk bakers's budgets, the weight of battle bread slowly dwindled. 3.5 ounces, 3 ounces, 2.5 ounces, and then down to the roughly two ounces that the bread weighs today. All for the same price of 50 centavos, equivalent to about seven cents.
And people are complaining. One local woman living in La Paz compared her morning bread to eating "a bit of air", as well as a "Communion wafer".
