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catscradle Nov. 16th, 2002 08:27 am)
catscradle Nov. 16th, 2002 08:27 am)I'm reading a book on the rise of corporate global power and came across some amazing statistics - the kind you read and think that if the country at large knew about it, there would be riots in the streets. But there won't be because the people that need to read this information don't.
In the US, 10 billion dollars a year is lost to corporate tax evasion. That's 10 billion dollars a year that the average middle/lower class American people have to make up so that US corporations and multi-nationals don't have to pay their fair share of taxes - so that these entities can continue to lie to us - tell us how bad the economy is, lay us off work, et cetera.
How do they do they get away with the ole "the economy is bad, we need to lay off people, cut benefits, retirement, and basically ruin people's lives" crap?
In the 1990's corporations were reporting record insane earnings that had no basis in reality. By the beginning of 2002 they then claimed profits had dropped dramatically. For instance, to use a company that isn't Enron, Exxon, Qwest, et cetera, GM reported a 73% loss in profit. It wasn't real - they were never making the earnings they claimed in the 90's - and in 2001, they were still bringing in a profit of 800 million dollars. That's not 800 million total, folks. That's 800 million after you deduct all the costs it takes to run GM. And all the major corporations are doing this. It's not just GM.
To top all that off, IRS tax audit of big business have gone done by 25% while tax audits of people making less than $25,000 have gone up by 13%. That's because someone has to pick up the slack for all that lost revenue and there are more of us than them.
They need more of us, by the way. They're seeing to it that there will be even more of us:
White House Wages Stealth War on Condoms
We need a Dickens for our times. This crap is all right out of Oliver Twist, Nicholas Nickleby and Great Expectations - Read Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, we're right back to the horrors of the industrial revolution. Where are our social reformers these days?
I go to bed angry and I wake up angry. What wrong with us? Why aren't we storming the Capital, the Whitehouse? Too French revolution for us?
This situation is only going to get worse. Do we have to wait till there is absolutely nothing to lose before we start acting?
Work cited:
Allison, Bill, Charles Lewis & the Center for Public Integrity. The Cheating of America. Harper Collins, 2001. Pgs 11-13, 15, 79, 82-83.
Anderson, Sarah, John Cavanagh. Top 200: The Rise of Corporate Global Power. Decemeber, 2000.
In the US, 10 billion dollars a year is lost to corporate tax evasion. That's 10 billion dollars a year that the average middle/lower class American people have to make up so that US corporations and multi-nationals don't have to pay their fair share of taxes - so that these entities can continue to lie to us - tell us how bad the economy is, lay us off work, et cetera.
How do they do they get away with the ole "the economy is bad, we need to lay off people, cut benefits, retirement, and basically ruin people's lives" crap?
In the 1990's corporations were reporting record insane earnings that had no basis in reality. By the beginning of 2002 they then claimed profits had dropped dramatically. For instance, to use a company that isn't Enron, Exxon, Qwest, et cetera, GM reported a 73% loss in profit. It wasn't real - they were never making the earnings they claimed in the 90's - and in 2001, they were still bringing in a profit of 800 million dollars. That's not 800 million total, folks. That's 800 million after you deduct all the costs it takes to run GM. And all the major corporations are doing this. It's not just GM.
To top all that off, IRS tax audit of big business have gone done by 25% while tax audits of people making less than $25,000 have gone up by 13%. That's because someone has to pick up the slack for all that lost revenue and there are more of us than them.
They need more of us, by the way. They're seeing to it that there will be even more of us:
White House Wages Stealth War on Condoms
We need a Dickens for our times. This crap is all right out of Oliver Twist, Nicholas Nickleby and Great Expectations - Read Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, we're right back to the horrors of the industrial revolution. Where are our social reformers these days?
I go to bed angry and I wake up angry. What wrong with us? Why aren't we storming the Capital, the Whitehouse? Too French revolution for us?
This situation is only going to get worse. Do we have to wait till there is absolutely nothing to lose before we start acting?
Work cited:
Allison, Bill, Charles Lewis & the Center for Public Integrity. The Cheating of America. Harper Collins, 2001. Pgs 11-13, 15, 79, 82-83.
Anderson, Sarah, John Cavanagh. Top 200: The Rise of Corporate Global Power. Decemeber, 2000.
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I find it hard to form a true position, to find a position which is not near-completely negative... What I read and see suggests to me that people are almost unwilling to feel the sort of righteous anger to which the situation entitles them; everyone wants to blame an individual, instead of even considering that perhaps the overall system is at fault. I hate the cult of personality, but it appears to rule almost everything, and be one of the few effective methods to achieve anything at all. I don't know -- I'm not making sense, and my thoughts feel like blurry orange streetlights in blackness... sometimes, people seem so disgustingly self-satisfied, my head hurts.
On a lighter note, I'd rather wish for a Mrs Gaskell than a Dickens. I get so annoyed when the only one in that group people remember is the one with the most insulting view of women. It's such a silly thing to get worked up about; that a man long dead was sexist. *chuckle*
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As for Dickens. . . I don't know. He portrayed most men as such utterly disgusting individuals I almost think it works out in the end. And wrong as it might be - and it is - Mrs Gaskell didn't have the same following. In terms of writers that helped with social reform, it's Dicken people remember - and to give him credit, much of the social reform that occured in his era, did so because of his writing and popularity. While I hate to say it was the popularity of the writer that incited change, rather than people taking note of the injustice all on their own - I can't. Sometimes it needs both pointed out to people and good PR.