Documented, Wisconsin's Debt. Result Of Corporate Tax Breaks, Not Unions!

reply to post by Flatfish


Teachers are paid for by public money too. Go figure.

reply to post by HoldTheBeans


I'm just saying that they should pay their fair share and we shouldn't be paying them to extract our resources and then sell them back to us, making record profits year after year, while our infrastructure is collapsing and America falls into economic upheaval.

I wish somebody paid me to live here in Texas, it's getting to the point that it may not be worth it to stay here for free.

Originally posted by HoldTheBeans
reply to post by Flatfish

 

Teachers are paid for by public money too. Go figure.

That's common knowledge, I'm not sure I get your point, aren't they teaching the public's children?

reply to post by SM2


I take it you never read your power bill, do you?

I've been paying an "undergrounding fee" to the power company for as long as I can recall to pay for putting lines underground, along with several other fees that actually build the grid. So they aren't using just their own money. They get massive tax breaks for stuff they never do, or never intend to do, but the subsidy pays for "planning", like the deregulation mess that ripped off California customers for billions, none of which was returned to the original rippees, but was diverted into corporate programs for the most part.

Corporations don't pay anything like what they cost the country: most of our military bill should be paid for by the corporations whose profits and bad behavior they protect. Has BP paid the government the cost of firefighting, Coast Guard use, FEMA, etc? No, they haven't, sicking it to the taxpayers whose jobs and lives they've ruined. Are the gas & oil companies mitigating the contaminated water problems they are causing by fracking? No.

I guess you don't remember Love Canal: a hoorendous pollution mess the corporate world refused to take responsibility for or to pay for the consequences of their actions.

To solve the fiscal problems of this country, I'd suggest offering this optin to our mega-millionaire corporatists: start hiring 200K American workers a month and generate something with them, or face a one-time 20% tax on their current wealth, not income, no shelters, their total wealth.

If they can't find something productive to do with 200K workers, they have no business being in business. Why 200K per month? Because we add ~165K per moth due to population growth. 200K per month would barely make a dent in the unemployment, but its better than nothing.

Corporations are run by self-centered individuals whose primary goal is looking out for #1, not in sharing or solving the problems they've created...hell, the whole point of incorporating is to duck personal responsibilty when things fall apart. Most big corporations are filled with sociopaths at their highest levels.

Taxed too highly?

Give me a break.

Corporations need to be held accountable for their behavior, but since that seems to be impossible, taxing them into breaking up wouldn't be a bad idea: perhaps a super-tax on super-size corporations?

reply to post by apacheman


Very well stated, I agree with you 100%. I thank you for jumping in and contributing to the content in this thread as I can use all the help I can get. These anti-union/pro-corporate cronies don't give up easily, if at all. Although, I have to give them an E for effort.

You do realize what would happen to your modern way of life if you taxed the big corporations into breaking up don't you? Most goods and services you consume or utilize daily that many take for granted, are provided by the huge corporations. The internet you are using currently is courtesy of a huge corporation. The food you eat, the medicines you take, the clothes you wear etc are made affordable due to these "evil" corporations you hate so much. Yeah, tax them to death so they can no longer make the profit margin they deem necessary to stay in business. You wouldnt be able to afford a computer, car, food or clothes.

What have unions done in the past 20 years that are actually good for the workers they claim to represent? Is running entire industries into bankruptcy a good thing? Putting states on the brink of bankruptcy is a good thing? Yeah that 6 weeks of paid vacation and the secruity of knowing that you pretty much can not get fired because you are in a union, large percentage pay raises annually, regardless of your performance , all this sounds great. Answer me this though. What happens when the employer has to make good on all of those promises the unions forced on them come due? In case you can not answer, i will. More government bailouts, more unemployment, more companies going bankrupt. All the while the top dogs of the Union get just as rich as the "evil greedy corp executives" off of the money you willingly and blindly give them to represent your best interests. In most cases they do not represent your best interests, but their own and union brass' best interest, they care not one iota for you, until you stop paying your dues. Unions, especially in the government sector are just leeches sucking you dry. Maybe not today, but eventually they will run businesses out of competition.

reply to post by SM2


Swallowed the wrong pill, eh?

Corporations don't actually make much of anything, the actual, tangible products are created by the sub-contractors of the subsidiaries.

Break up the big guys and the middle will step up and fill any holes....mostly the big corporations are merely financial shells to hold and manipulate the real stuff, losing them wouldn't effect actual production negatively, in fact, it would probably spur efficiency and development of new products, which is currently being stifled. Most "new" things are mere embellishments of existing product: actual new products introduce uncertainty into the marketplace, uncertainty is an anethema to corporatists, because then they'd have to actually prove they are worth what they pay themselves. Far better to control the business environment and keep it predictable.

Taxing them into breakup would actually be beneficial, creating real marketplace competition. What we have now is only quasi-competitive at best: it might be better termed a distributed monopoly, i.e., multiple members, but few enough to have the power to fix prices, control resources, and shift economies

You do know how the Inca, a strong nation of millions, was conquered by less than 200 Spaniards, don't you? The 200 spaniards were psychopaths and/or sociopaths, to a man. They slaughtered the ruling class and took control of the government, perverting it to their own ends.

We have as many or more of such psychopaths today as then. The very nature of corporatism gives such people the environment and cloak in and under which to thrive. If you want to really match behaviors to diagnosis, you'd be hard put to find anyone who isn't a sociopath in the boardrooms of the higher echelon companies.

And I agree that union leadership is generally awful...I fought for several years and helped force several elections to get a clean one in mine, not that it did much good...the parent union stepped in and functionally took us over, leaving our leaders mere figureheads. For that I blame the sociopathic corporate culture: only another sociopath can survive long amongst them, so eventually you wind up with union sociopaths dealing with corporate ones, and no one but the sociopaths are happy, and few understand why. But that doesn't mean that unions in and of themselves are a bad thing; action in concert, taken after full and informed discussion by a multitude, is usually better than leaving your fate up to folks who view you as a disposable commodity rather than a fellow citizen.

So don't blame the unions or even their leadership for the conditions created by sociopathic corporations.

So Pfizer doesnt make medication? Proctor and gamble doesnt actually manufacture anything? Gm doesnt really make cars? really, well that is all new to me. Seeing as though I have family that work at manufacturing plants for those companies, and um, last time i checked, they physically manufactured items.

reply to post by SM2


Well, first define Pfizer.

Where is it?

Is it one huge plant located somewhere here in the states that produces every single pill and product they sell?

Pfizer, the manufacturer, is actually a bunch of middle to large size labs and pill factories located around the world.

Pfizer, the corporation, is much smaller: a few dozen executives and board members who control the thing.

Eliminating one will not eliminate the other.

really? Umm, no. The manufacturing plants are Pfizer. yes there are multiple facilities. However they are one entity. Last time i looked at my wife's paycheck it said Pfizer on it. She is a finance manager for them. Yes they have several divsions like consumer health (robitusin, chapstick etc) then animal health, etc but they are all Pfizer inc.

reply to post by SM2


I suppose if you can't see, you can't see.

Perhaps we should talk again when you've had a chance to observe more; when you get a few more years experience, you might be able to understand that eliminating the headquarters doesn't implode the factory if it is producing a good product efficiently, rather it stimullates it to step up explore other options denied by that headquarters. If not, then it goes away....then instead of Pfizer on the check, it will be something else. But as long as a need exists, and a capacity to fill that need, then someone with drive and energy will fill it.

Funny how little faith corporatists really have in the free market they espouse.

well if the headquarters were removed, then Pfizer would no longer exist. Now if another corporation purchased the patents from the company entrusted to handle those for a hypothetically defunct pfizer, and also purchased that particular plant then yes, that specific plant could again make that specific product, not necessarily with the same workforce. pfizer hold the patents, copyrights etc to each product.Otherwise, the Pfizer products would not be made by anyone, anywhere. Seems like someone else in this conversation needs more experience. Yes some corporations use some contractors to manufacture some of their. Like Proctor and gamble does not technically manufacture Ivory soap any longer. A contractor makes it, sends it to a proctor and gamble facility where it is packaged. Not all corporations work this way, and Proctor and gamble does not operate this way exclusively. In addition, some of these corporation use contract labor at corporate facilities to manufacture produts. Where they pay a temp agency to provide the work force and administration. That is usually done in the packaging areas, or raw material handling areas of a manufacturing facility.

Originally posted by SM2

The internet you are using currently is courtesy of a huge corporation.

Again, you might want to fact check your information. I could be wrong but it was my understanding that the internet, in it's earliest form, was created by that huge corporation known as the U.S. government for the purpose of guaranteeing "Mutual Assured Destruction" in the event of a first strike against the U.S. being carried out by the U.S.S.R.. I think it was initially developed so that our computers here at home would respond to a first strike even if our command structure had been knocked out. At first, I believe it was banned for public use. Here are two links that detail the history of the creation of the internet;

www.livinginternet.com...
en.wikipedia.org...

It is also my understanding that much the same way that his father introduced the bill creating the Interstate Highway System, It was dear ole Al Gore who supposedly fathered the bill to make the internet accessible to the public. I'm not saying that he created it, only that he made it available for public use.

More often than not, corporations don't even enter the picture until all of the research & development had been done with public funds usually in the form of government grants to universities involved in the research. Once the technology has been developed, then the corporation are more than happy to jump in and reap as much profit as possible.

Yes the internet was originally a darpa project, I did say the internet you use. Not the internet in its original form, or the internet that the military uses or the internet that Al gore invented. The internet you use now. It is brought to your home via telephone cables ( or to your isp's center via T1 etc) which are owned by AT&T. So, how would you access the internet without a big corporation? Doesnt matter which isp you use, AT&T is involved with its traffic in the US at some point or another.

reply to post by SM2


So I'm supposed to be forever grateful to AT&T for stepping in and getting rich by providing a conduit to access technology that my tax dollars paid to create? What internet business would AT&T be selling if we, the american taxpayer, didn't spend the money to create it in the first place?

I never said you should be grateful for anything. I was just saying that the "evil" corporations you hate so much provide nearly every product or service you use daily, and that unions are just as bad and even worse in some cases.

Originally posted by ~Lucidity
What's at work here, and what this article is pointing out, is that there is demonization propaganda against the unions in this country, as there has been since Reagan busted the first unions in preparation for the systematic dismantling of this country, and particularly the middle class. They will blame the unions for, set them up, and accuse them of all sorts of things because the unions stand in their way. Plain and simple.

Of course the debt is a result of tax breaks. It's also exacerbated by the eroding tax base that is a direct result of these same corporations and governments shipping our work offshore, lowering wages for the remaining jobs, allowing the importation and illegal immigration of foreign workers who either pay little or no taxes, giving huge tax shelters and loopholes to both the corporations and the rich, and allowing the rich to stash their money in offshore bank accounts to avoid paying,

No workers, no taxes to pay for things. Who couldn't have predicted this? If they couldn't, then why are they running our businesses and our country? If they could, ask yourself why they let it happen.

So sure. Blame the unions now. And when all the unions are gone, ask yourself who their going to blame next.

edit on 2/17/2011 by ~Lucidity because: (no reason given)

THECAP TIMES: "your progressive voice" I 'll look at it but I don't put much faith into it....

Originally posted by 46ACE

THECAP TIMES: "your progressive voice" I 'll look at it but I don't put much faith into it....

It's more important that you look at the link to the Wisconsin Legislative Fiscal Report contained within the article as that's where the proof is. The numbers don't lie, see for yourself.

Originally posted by SM2
I never said you should be grateful for anything. I was just saying that the "evil" corporations you hate so much provide nearly every product or service you use daily, and that unions are just as bad and even worse in some cases.

I was a union worker and representative for 32 yrs. before I retired. I even helped to charter two new Locals during that time and never once did we get any assistance financial or otherwise, from the government. Much less, have the R&D completed and the product dumped in our lap to sell for unlimited profit and for an unlimited amount of time.

Reminds me of the outrageous prices being charged for MRI screening when the entire technology was developed in space by NASA at taxpayer expense. When does the the taxpaying monkey get any sort of return on his investment?

Actually the wrong corporations are receiving the tax breaks and other government favors.

Most domestic corporations and small businesses pay an enormous amount of taxes because they can't afford the huge accounting firms that understand the tax code and because of all the regulations placed on them.

Multi-nationals however pay a very low tax rate. GE for example pays about a 3% tax rate. That same GE is also in bed with the government. They shift jobs overseas and create products that irradiate people and poison the environment. Compare that to a large and generally domestic corporation like Disney which pays at a 36% tax rate.

Notice how GE gets to move jobs overseas and pay low taxes, notice how GM gets a bailout and builds plants in Mexico, notice how Wall Street ruins the economy and gets bailouts as well. Then notice how Disney, which has domestic studios and offices, gets slapped with a high tax rate, both federal and state. Also notice how many mom-and-pop businesses, small corps, independent farmers, get taxed and regulated to death.

We need to stop looking at business in general as the ones killing the economy and causing problems.

We need to start looking at how the government and certain (very large and powerful) corporations are colluding for their own profit and at the same time destroying us.