When readers like you and me and others refer to companies or people therein as "they", it's sloppiness on our part. A company is a thing, not a person, even if it is comprised by people.
Spot on. Most do not realize that the Justice Roberts Supreme Court ruling recognizing corporations as "persons" created a serious loophole for corporate tax dodging and campaign contributions. There is so much corruption on both sides it's astonishing. I'm very troubled by the recent move in defending the "1%" through examples of a "free market" (an illusion) and capitalism. None of them will earn a fraction of what these people earn. My father was an investment banker with Bear Stearns until retiring in the late 90's. Most are "born into" money and status, very common among my family's "social circle" in the financial sector. It is an "old boys" club, wealth is passed down through generations and success "earned" (i.e. stolen) from many living paycheck to paycheck. Trickle down economics doesn't work. The wealthy are wealthy for one reason: they're cheap. They do not invest their earnings into their company unless it directly benefits them. Defending them is tantamount to a jewish man defending the Third Reich.
I was bewildered by the uproar and mockery of the "Occupy Wall Street" movement. Defending the bankers and investors who played god with their money by betting against defaults and voodoo mathematical "derivatives" claiming to support a "free market" was rather ironic. Instilling "groupthink" into the masses that capitalism is a working economic system merely benefits the very people that created this mess and walked away wealthier. The CFO's and top level executives let lower level executives fall on their swords, while Bernanke and others sold stock before the '08 collapse the likes of which came close to an international "Great Depression".
The collapse of Iceland's economy involving the Icelandic Bank Kaupthing is a perfect example of an unchecked capitalist system. A rather complicated bank that was destroyed at the hands of the banks former chairman and Robert and Vincent Tchenguiz. Numerous internal documents from Kaupthing Bank from just prior to the collapse of Iceland's banking sector, which led to the 20082009 Icelandic financial crisis, show that suspiciously large sums of money were loaned to various owners of the bank, and large debts written off. The government took control and did not bail the banks out, and now Iceland is returning to a prosperous stance pre-2000. Many key players made off with private jets, multi-million dollar homes. March 2013 saw the opening of new prosecutions in Reykjavík against the bank's former chairman and other leading employees for 'orchestrating five large-scale market manipulation conspiracies', in what was the largest prosecutation related to the 2008 Icelandic financial crisis so far.
This is an example of what occurred globally. I had an econ professor once state, "The difference between capitalism and communism is that communism doesn't hide under a veil of a 'free market'". Rather profound.
We have become so polarized by our media and politicians that the cold war has been replaced by Islamic terrorists (Halliburton has to make their money somehow) and red flag terms relating Socialism to Marxism/Communism. We're well behind other first world nations in education, standard of living, longevity yet we continue to cut funding while funneling more federal tax dollars to a military that outspends North Korea 75 to 1.
We have become pawns in a sociopolitical game of chess, too distracted fighting each other to collectively work together, holding elected officials accountable for back room deals and policies. Most don't even know the true definition and concept of a Socialized Democracy. Hint: it's been alive and well in the U.S. for a long time. Without it, public schools, firemen, police, infrastructures wouldn't exist. We're so emotionally volatile most become enraged, comparing socialism to communism, while the U.K., Canada, France, Germany, Australia and many others laugh at us. Open your eyes and minds, stop fighting each other and work collectively. History has shown change occurs by unifying a populace, we will never change for the better if we're easily divided with rhetoric most do not understand.
