Ray wrote:
> Business once had a contract with the society to supply jobs when
> they could get by with less. That's the original reason for the
> advantage being given to the private sector through tax incentives
> like the Oil Depletion Allowance to the Oil companies. That was
> when business considered themselves members of a community. That
> was being a good citizen. They MADE work as well as a product.
> That is all changed in my lifetime and businesses sole purpose today
> is to provide profit to the shareholders.
See also:
http://www.truth-out.org/american-corporations-want-more-consumers-less-workers61422
American Corporations Want More Consumers, Less Workers
Thursday 15 July 2010
by: Robert Parry
A hard truth about the U.S. economy is that corporations
don't need as many of us as workers but still need us as
consumers. That dilemma helps explain why unemployment is stuck
near 10 percent and why the economic recovery is stumbling toward
a double dip.
The Washington Post reported Thursday that nonfinancial companies
are sitting on $1.8 trillion – about one-fourth more than at
the start of the recession – but won't add personnel
in part because they're waiting for consumer demand to pick
up, which isn't happening because many Americans don't
have jobs or are afraid of losing theirs.
[snip]
> Being declared citizens by the court they have supra-right to move
> on or off shore with none of the responsibilities of a normal
> citizen.
The little-lamented MAI (Multilateral Agreement on Investment) of a
dozen or so years ago was an attempt to ensure, by treaty that
supervened over domestic law, the rights of these super-citizens.
Under the MAI, only "investors" would ultimately have rights. The
world would then be populated by a few thousand corporate and other
institutional entities, a few hundred enormously wealthy individuals or
families and perhaps a few sovereign entities. The rest of us would
be reduced to the status of biomass. The right even to "potential
profit" from an investment would have trumped the right of signatory
governments to protect their citizens or territory from the harmful --
even disastrous -- consequences of exploiting that investment.
And whole flocks, covens and congeries of politicians, lobbyists,
financiers, lawyers and the other things that live under the same
rocks were involved in putting this all together. It was (AFAICT)
happenstance that a draft of the document was leaked and inspired
global resistance.
But the things under the rocks are still working on it. They have the
money, the expertise, the political influence and the selrighteous
passion to keep plugging away at making the world safe for investors.
I don't like occupying the role of biomass any more than Ray does.
FWIW,
- Pondscum McKrill
--
Michael Spencer Nova Scotia, Canada .~.
/V\
[email protected] /( )\
http://home.tallships.ca/mspencer/ ^^-^^
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