Tag: class-war

How The Rich Are Winning The Class War (via Blogadoccio’s Blog)

On By southwerkIn business ethics

I think that the No Child Left Behind law had severely damaged character education, critical thinking and issue awareness among the young. An ability to take multiple choice tests, true false, or completion tests is not a useful employment skill. Yet that has become almost our sole measurement of educational achievement.

But the inaction of the middle class, whatever it’s cause, is critical to the success of the rich in shifting the tax burden.

James Pilant

The rich won the class war by depriving the middle and lower classes of education: history, civics, political education, and training in how to think critically. As a result, their mouthpieces can spout nonsense and the relatively uneducated voters now swallow it clean. The antidote, until we get a real education system back again, is for those of use whose eyes are open to educate those around us who cannot see what is going on. We need to devel … Read More

via Blogadoccio's Blog

PROOF that tax cuts do not create jobs: Bush’s decade was a lost decade for U.S. economy, workers (via Under the Mountain Bunker)

On By southwerkIn business ethics3 Comments

I always thought that once supply side economics failed in the 1980’s, the idea would be dead. That was a major miscalculation on my part. The idea that cutting taxes raises revenue is so much fun for some people, that facts do not inconvenience them.

James Pilant

PROOF that tax cuts do not create jobs: Bush's decade was a lost decade for U.S. economy, workers From the Washington Post: There has been zero net job creation since December 1999. No previous decade going back to the 1940s had job growth of less than 20 percent. Economic output rose at its slowest rate of any decade since the 1930s as well. Middle-income households made less in 2008, when adjusted for inflation, than they did in 1999 — and the number is sure to have declined further during a difficult 2009. The Aughts were the first decade … Read More

via Under the Mountain Bunker

Policy failures of the GOP: the debt could disappear if the rich paid taxes at 1960s levels (via Under the Mountain Bunker)

On By southwerkIn business ethics3 Comments

Well, yeah. I knew that.

James Pilant

Is anyone surprised by this? Yet discussion of increasing tax revenues from the wealthy and corporations is off the table,  no compromise, according to the teaparty Republicans. If Corporations And The Rich Paid Taxes At The Same Level As The 1960s, The Debt Would Disappear … [Institute for Policy Studies’ (IPS) Sam] Pizzigati cites an IPS paper from last spring to make the argument that if corporations and households making more than $1 millio … Read More

via Under the Mountain Bunker

When there are no good jobs left in America, there will be no middle-class (via Under the Mountain Bunker)

On By southwerkIn business ethics2 Comments

The job situation in America is a great moral and ethical question.

Over the past three decades, jobs have been exported, eliminated or converted downward into low pay service or part time jobs. This has enriched a small number of Americans – the top one percent of the population now controls 42.7 percent of the financial wealth of the nation – the top ten percent have 93 percent of the nation’s wealth.

The result – – the bottom 90 percent of the American people own 7% of the nation’s wealth.

If globalism and free trade are inevitable. If the free market is the best method of determining economic results, then a continuation of this is all that awaits us.

Americans are handicapped when it comes to having jobs in a world wide market. Americans have roads, bridges, police, fire departments, educational systems and an extensive military. These require taxes. Corporations have no desire to pay taxes and so they go to countries who have favorable tax laws or are willing to forego taxes for the jobs shipped there. Americans tend to be well educated and middle class. This means they will not work for 75 cents an hour and expect to be treated with some respect while having a high survivability on the job. This is inimical to the interests of corporations. It is easier to manipulate and use poorly educated people with no social standing. Safety costs money and killing Americans draws attention while dead foreigners are less of a problem. Americans live in a nation that has laws. Corporations do not want laws restricting their activities and they absolutely do not want to be prosecuted for their crimes.

So, if globalization and free trade are inevitable all we have to do to compete in a global economy is to give up way of life and gradually drift downward in our standard of living but only for the bottom 90%.

Is this a moral outcome?

Are the citizens of the United States similar to bacteria on a slide under a microscope? Do they deserve that level of analysis? .. the cold powerful corporate intellect realizing that a dash of penicillin could clear the way for new corporate profits?

Or do human beings have souls? Do Americans have a duty one to another? Do companies organized and financed in this nation bear a responsibility for their economic decisions?

There are things like justice, honor and duty. These are a joke in the world of the international corporation. I don’t believe these ideas draw laughter among the general population.

James Pilant

From Business Insider: 40 Facts That Prove The Working Class Is Being Systematically Wiped Out. Here are 10 of the 40 facts: #9 — Only 66.8% of American men had a job last year. That was the lowest level that has ever been recorded in all of U.S. history #10 — During this economic downturn, employee compensation in the United States has been the lowest that it has been relative to gross domestic product in over 50 years #11 — The number of “low i … Read More

via Under the Mountain Bunker