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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsCorporate greed gave us Trump. Careful what you wish for!
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1239910378483613697.htmlThread: Corporate greed gave us Trump. Careful what you wish for!
Large corporations support Trump and the GOP because they want low taxes and a small government with ineffective rules and regulations, allowing them to act corruptly and without regard for consequences.
Lets start with taxes. Large corporations dont want to pay their fair share of taxes and they know the GOP will give them what they want. They also know this means the US Government will be unprepared for things like pandemics, but they dont care about long term consequences.
They got what they wanted on the tax front. Trump gave them huge tax cuts and they blew all that money buying back their own shares, driving up their share prices without having to become more productive or to innovate, and they got rich from it.
How about regulations? They dont want to have to treat workers well or have regard for things like pollution and greenhouse gasses. They only care about profits. So they want a federal government thats unprepared for things like pandemics as long as their stock keeps going up.
But guess what? A pandemic is here now, and we have the exact kind of government big corporations want. A government that has underfunded long term priorities and is unprepared for calamity. And all those stock price gains are gone. POOF!!!
Turns out the federal government is kind of important. You need a strong, competent federal government, funded by corporate taxes, to be prepared for a pandemic. Big corporations knew that, but they didnt care. They were blinded by greed, and now they are paying the price.
So what will corporate America do now? Theyll stick out their hand and ask Uncle Sam to bail them out, of course. They are fat and lazy and dont know how to cope with externalities. They rely on the same federal government that theyve rendered inept.
How about next time we make corporations pay their fare share so that we are prepared for this kind of thing and we can have long-term, sustained growth, aided by a government that is appropriately concerned about externalities, rather than solely focused on short term profits?
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Corporate greed gave us Trump. Careful what you wish for! (Original Post)
pbmus
Mar 2020
OP
FiveGoodMen
(20,018 posts)1. And we've known better for a LONG time!
Jefferson might not have wanted a lot of government, but he wanted enough government to assert the sovereignty of citizens over corporations. To his view, nothing was more important to the health of the republic.
In the early years of the 19th century, as banks and corporations began to flex their political muscles, he announced that: I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country.
There are those who would have us believe that the founders intended for corporations to control our elections and, tragically, five of these Tories sit on the U.S. Supreme Court, where they recently ruled that the nations biggest businesses may spend whatever they like to buy the results that best serve their bottom lines.
The better angels among the founders would be aghast.
https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/thomas-jefferson-feared-aristocracy-corporations/