Forum Post: Corporate Extortion

Extortion is illegal (except I guess when there is a "market"). Over the last three decades corporations have done everything possible to strip down working conditions and take extreme measures to control employees and murder the competition. Predominantly fortune 500 companies have been using these tactics but smaller companies who have been able to survive without being gobbled up by the 500's and the red tape laws they lobby against competitors and smaller fish...have adopted their model of stress management and stripping down employee incomes, rights, safety and dignity to the bare minimum. This Romneyism downsizing has only been strengthened and risen exponentially under Trump. They both believe in trickle down economics. (both have never been at the bottom to understand it can't and doesn't trickle down). It does make corporations and the wealthy more rich and powerful which they feel ENTITLED to. They have convinced the public unions are terrible terrible things which steal from the people. Meanwhile the people making union wages are the only ones left holding up the entire economy on their taxable (less stripped down) wages. Corporate loopholes have made it so corporations no longer pay taxes. Without union wages - then the country would no longer be operable. Social security would cease to function, and all other wages would fall even lower, since unions use their employee dues to lobby against corporate deregulation and kickbacks as well as fight for decent wage, and OSHA laws, as well as family leave. Because of anti-union propaganda union wages have also been stagnating and it's becoming harder and harder for them to fight back against billionaire hedge funds and their lap dog politicians.

When corporations realized workers were having too many rights here in America and that we also didn't like pollution of our waterways and air - they hauled all of their labor offshore and began massively exploiting the citizenry in other nations - even children - to work as actual slaves. They at the same time began to consolidate their wealth into ever growing partnerships that came together with the extra money they made off of reducing workers to slaves - to bribe politicians to make their corporate profit dreams come true and take it even further - pushing for deregulation of markets to allow them to operate as they please. Some jobs couldn't be outsourced - so they began hiring and exploiting illegal immigrants - and bribed government to overlook it. The massive influx of people to this nation was in response the fact that they could come here and get hired by these companies as well as the government would overlook this exploitation (ie the egg farmer atrocity and exploitation more like enslavement of child migrants). (and the Dedham amendment which sought to rid the nation of our "expensive" truck labor and would allow them to get rif od DOT rules to hire Mexican drivers at a cheaper price. Now they have turned on the people who they incentivized to come here - and turn them into the village scapegoats - anytime people start mentioning the swamp, we collectively see media outlets race baiting and dividing the population.

Companies took on the position that if there was an opportunity to make money then ethics could and were dismissed as "crazy special snowflake ideals." It's not that workers were unhappy with the decaying conditions (it was that we are lazy). In this new environment - the gigging of jobs, outsourcing, neo-libertarian trickle down age - as long as there is a market - anything goes - iregardless if anything but stress is trickling down.

This all created an entire new problem for our country: The stagflation of taxpayer wages while prices continue to rise. Without taxpayer money governments decided they must rely on Big Daddy Corporations to help pay their bills. Individual cities and towns began rolling out the red carpet for developers and landlords and chain stores - who they believed would "create jobs" and add to the tax base. In an ironic twist of stupidity they offered them tax incentives to "come to their towns".

Spending taxpayer money doesn't create jobs. Taxpayers having extra time and money does. So while government reaches in to steal from the taxpayers to "create jobs" - they are creating a cycle of debt which can't and won't be re-paid and giving corporations ever more power to buy land and resources which they can horde and further extort and strip down citizens aka workers. Trump thinks this is great business! (Draining the swamp turned into stripping down OSHA rules so employers could exploit front line workers in the middle of a dangerous pandemic). While boldy lying to the American people that they believe front line workers are heros who deserve our thanks and respect?!!! Apparently Trump believed the swamp needing to be drained was all those pesky (sore loser) workers demanding a voice and rights and fair labor. IF that isn't clear to people now - then they may need their IQ's checked.

One has to wonder about this. They obviously know workers know they are being exploited. Lying to our faces behind a fake smile doesn't change it. So who are they lying for? Why even bother to state it? So who is buying this BS? Retired baby boomers? Do they believe it because they don't have to live it? And if this is the case - if retired baby boomers aren't feeling the pain from the Trump economy - then how do we get them to understand what is happening from the perspective of the workers? How do we get them to understand that deregulation and this sad new world is creating conditions which is going to effect them. How do we get them to see the lies and hypocrisy?