Forum Post: Unions have donated more than corporations!
Posted 13 years ago on Oct. 16, 2011, 1:17 a.m. EST by IminTexas
(33)
from La Marque, TX
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
I keep hearing about the evils of corporate money in politics, but no outrage about union money in politics. Hypocrisy? It's more than hypocrisy. Unions have donated MUCH more than corporations during the past 22 years.
Top all time donors (1989-2011) INCLUDES PAC MONEY!
- ActBlue $55,745,059
- AT&T $47,571,779
- American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees. $46,167,658
- National Association of Realtors $40,718,176
- Service Employees International Union $37,634,367
- National Education Association $37,051,378
- Goldman Sachs $35,790,579
- American Association for Justice $34,715,804
- International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers $34,292,471
- Laborers Union $31,876,950
- American Federation of Teachers $31,681,366
- Teamsters Union $31,285,842
- Carpenters and Joiners Union $30,769,258
- Communication Workers of America $30,192,447
- Citigroup $28,842,146
- American Medical Association $27,880,935
- United Auto Workers $27,539,652
- United Food and Commercial Workers Union $27,344,608
- National Auto Dealers Association $26,966,358
- Machinists & Aerospace Workers Union $26,879,727
While corporations have to actually earn the money they donate, unions can just steal the money from their members' paychecks. Where's the outrage? I thought you guys didn't like money in politics! You can't have it one way or the other. Have all the money in politics or NO MONEY AT ALL.
SOURCE: http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/list.php?order=A
Open Secrets is ran by the Center for Responsive Politics, a non-profit, non-partisan research group based in Washington D.C. The Center was founded in 1983 by retired U.S. Senators Frank Church of Idaho (a Democrat) and Hugh Scott of Pennsylvania (a Republican). OpenSecrets.org, has won four Webby Awards (2001, 2002, 2006, 2007) for being the best politics site online. In 2010, OpenSecrets.org was named a Webby Official Honoree.
What about lobbyist expenditures? The same organization you cite, opensecrects.org, reports that the US Chamber of Commerce, the business and corporation trade group has spent over $770 million on lobbying since 1998 alone. $770 million in 9 fewer years! The highest spending union only donated $46 million and it took them 9 more years to do it! Look at the entire list of lobbyist expenditures and you'll realize that the amount that unions spend to influence law makers is not even close to what corporation spend.
Here is the list of top lobbyist expenditure from 1998 to 2011:
US Chamber of Commerce $770,655,680; American Medical Assn $252,037,500; General Electric $251,940,000; AARP $207,432,064; Pharmaceutical Rsrch & Mfrs of America $204,433,920; American Hospital Assn $203,648,736;Blue Cross/Blue Shield $169,655,236; National Assn of Realtors $166,150,553; Northrop Grumman $164,845,253; Exxon Mobil $163,512,742; Verizon Communications $158,014,841; Edison Electric Institute $154,005,999; Business Roundtable $150,550,000; Boeing Co $147,884,310; Lockheed Martin $142,374,763; AT&T Inc $126,449,336; Southern Co $124,130,694; General Motors $121,899,170; PG&E Corp $119,190,000; Pfizer Inc $114,757,268;
Source: http://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/top.php?indexType=s
You will hear no argument from me that money in politics is a problem, union or corporate. But understand the full nature of the problem before you go off on a tirade based on half-truths and incomplete stories. I mean look at the list above! Pfizer is on the bottom and they have spent more than double on lobbying in the last 13 years than any organization or PAC of any stripe has spent on campaign donations in the last 22!
I agree there should be no money involved at all! Pointing out that unions also seek to monopolize power doesn't negate arguments about corporate involvement in politics. All major donations from a single entity should be equally abhorred in the same manner that violations of antitrust laws are abhorred.
Agreed.
Unions used to be powerful.
In 2009, Business contributed over 14 times as much as Labor.
http://www.opensecrets.org/bigpicture/blio.php?cycle=2010
In 2010, Governors all over the country have been enacting or trying to enacting Union destroying legslation.
Perhaps, but your point is irrelevant, because many more people will come to your side when you are proactive (for “new” Business & Government solutions), instead of reactive (against “old” Business & Government solutions), which is why what we most immediately need is a comprehensive “new” strategy that implements all our various socioeconomic demands at the same time, regardless of party, and although I'm all in favor of taking down today's ineffective and inefficient Top 10% Management System of Business & Government, there's only one way to do it – by fighting bankers as bankers ourselves; that is, using a Focused Direct Democracy organized according to our current Occupations & Generations. Consequently, I have posted a 1-page Summary of the Strategically Weighted Policies, Organizational Operating Structures, and Tactical Investment Procedures necessary to do this at:
http://getsatisfaction.com/americanselect/topics/on_strategic_legal_policy_organizational_operational_structures_tactical_investment_procedures
Join
http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/StrategicInternationalSystems/
because we need 100,000 “support clicks” at AmericansElect.org to support a Presidential Candidate -- such as any given political opportunist you'd like to draft -- in support of the above bank-focused platform.
Most importantly, remember, as cited in the first link, that as Bank Owner-Voters in your 1 of 48 "new" Business Investment Groups (or "new" Congressional Committees) you become the "new" Congress replacing the "old" Congress according to your current Occupation & Generation, called a Focused Direct Democracy.
Therefore, any Candidate (or Leader) therein, regardless of party, is a straw man, a puppet; it's the STRATEGY – the sequence of steps – that the people organize themselves under, in Military Internet Formation of their Individual Purchasing & Group Investment Power, that's important. In this, sequence is key.
Why? Because there are Natural Social Laws – in mathematical sequence – that are just like Natural Physical Laws, such as the Law of Gravity. You must follow those Natural Social Laws or the result will be Injustice, War, etc.
The FIRST step in Natural Social Law is to CONTROL the Banks as Bank Owner-Voters. If you do not, you will inevitably be UNJUSTLY EXPLOITED by the Top 10% Management Group of Business & Government who have a Legitimate Profit Motive, just like you, to do so.
Consequently, you have no choice but to become Candidates (or Leaders) yourselves as Bank Owner-Voters according to your current Occupation & Generation.
So please JOIN the 2nd link so we can make our support clicks at AmericansElect.org when called for, at exactly the right time, by an e-mail from that group, in support of the above the bank-focused platform. If so, then you will see and feel how your goals can be accomplished within the above strategy as a “new” Candidate (or Leader) of your current Occupation & Generation.
"While corporations have to actually earn the money"
what an inflammatory comment
How else do you expect Democrats to get funding? Get corporations to fund Democrats, who will probably pass legislation that doesn't favor the corporations?
HA!
I don't see why Unions donating is a problem. Someone has to fight for a greener future, for worker rights, etc. You do realize that corporations like to maintain that global warming is nonsense, right?
I do agree that, if you can get corporate influence out of the way, then I'm willing to ban Union money from Washington, too. But corporations forced Unions to use this kind of tactic, if you'd ask me.
I'm glad someone has pointed out the role of unions in politics.
You should also mention the law firms (Trial Attorneys of America supported Obama) and nonprofits in addition to the unions.
This ranting that "corporations are not people" overlooks the fact that Citizens United was fought by a leftwing group that aired anti-Hillary Clinton youtubes - and the case was won on the principle of the right of the corporate person that also benefits unions and nonprofits. If you're going to rant that corporations aren't people and Citizens United should be repealed, you'll have to explain why your union and NGO friends get to keep donating to candidates and companies can't.
This idea that corporations are some sort of faceless evil is infantile nonsense -- corporations provide jobs and goods and services and most people interact with them in one way or another every day of their lives, and usually beneficially. NGOs and citizens' movements have accomplished enormous amounts with corporations in the last 50 years, getting them regulated to prevent environmental pollution and exploitation and getting them to become more socially responsible. This anti-corporate infantalism on the left means this movement will flash in the pan and then die, if it isn't taken over by Marxist sectarians and foreign government agents, and it may be already too late for that.
The recipes being offered by OWS operatives are all unadorned Marxist-Leninist collectivism -- you would think Americans would learn from what Russians went through for 75 years.
It's true that rank and file union members do not have a direct say in the candidate their union supports. I know. My family members have been in them. Union democracy is a fiction.
For all the ranting and raging about the Koch Brothers that goes on, I never see a tally on the left with all the millionaires there, and their contributions to movements including to this one (!), including those who seem to enjoy playing a worker in the movies, like Michael Moore. Add them all up, and see who comes out with more money and more clout.
I have problems with big, multinational corporations with connections to the government (because multinational corporations need diplomats to help them expand to other countries sometimes), that usually has a bunch of subsidiaries in offshore secrecy banks, and that tends to drain a third world country's resources away and keep the third world country poor. I don't have a problem with small businesses that has no connection with the government and who pays their proper taxes.
Unions = People Corporations = Profits
Maybe that's why I seem to like unions better
That is because corporations are to greedy to donate anything.
“While corporations have to actually earn the money they donate, unions can just steal the money from their members' paychecks” This is a blatant lie and propaganda.
There are federal laws that prohibit dues money from going to political donations
A member can donate to a union fund that goes to political donations if he or she elect to
The money that union members donate goes to the party or candidate that has the workers best interest in mind. And yes you can bet your ass the members are sick of being demonize by the one’s they fear the most
It just happens to be the ones being protested
Why don't you tell me who has done more for the worker in America than unions?
Who has stood up for worker more than unions?
Now that the unions are almost gone, look at America. Shouldn't it be in much better shape without those "demons"?
Tell me why things are so screwed up today.
Tell why people have lost their retirements in the stock market
Tell me why such a large percent of the population is one illness away from losing everything to the people we are protesting against.
The Communications community have been hit hard with outsourcing, people losing their jobs left and right. Perhaps if they were taxed more for the % of people they hire out-of-country, they would have less to give?
I am definitely against any kind of monopoly/corporation/union that holds such overwhelming power as to render other entities unable to have legitimate competition or legal sway. NEA is also ridiculously too big, and should be a state by state union and stop interfering with national politics unless it has to do with protecting the rights of it's workers. Protecting the rights of workers is a far cry off from pushing their political agenda at the expense of others, including fixing the crippled education system.
All private sources of money in politics will be eliminated in favor of complete public finance. All candidates will get the same amount of money and the same amount of free air time. No one will have a financial advantage. That is the crux of this movement. Remove all private sources of money from the political process.
Very new facebook page focused on that one goal. No parties, no other issues.
Help it grow, develop and contribute. There is another one, run by a member of the controlled elite media. Personally, I am suspect of those in the media. This one was started by one person 2 days ago. Hoping Americans can make it a ground swell issue.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Get-Money-Out-of-Politics/170454236375392
It’s the house of the rising sun dude, we are the prostituted ones.
TWELVE PERCENT of workers are still represented by unions. So if they're the ones buying the government, they aren't doing very well.
They get what they want out of it, NEA protects bad teachers (including rapists and others through tenure).
Again, TWELVE percent of workers are in unions. So claims that the unions are as powerful as corporations are nonsense. If these claims were true, most workers would have unions.
It's not a matter of 12 percent or 1 percent, it's a matter of swaying the government with finances instead of consensus. Either way, it's the people who should have the vote, not unions, corporations or entities.
Agreed.
Out of the top 10,000 contributors in 07--08. The NEA is number one. Give the teachers a raise by stopping to allow union leaders to donate to political candidates with union money.
http://www.followthemoney.org/database/top10000.phtml
here here!
The worst thing is, you don't get to choose whether to donate money to the union or whom the union contributes to.
That's not true "another uban legion"
This propaganda piece would be more realistic if you told everybody how many working people elected to donate small amounts of money to protect worker rights And then tell how many stock holders have a say in the donation and what they expected to get for it.
I guess maybe things like that should not be included in “anti-union propaganda”
Oh I get it, you just forgot.
These statistics are before the "Citizens United" decision. Corporate donations during the 2012 election and beyond will DWARF union donations. WAKE UP! Corporations already own our government - that includes the Supreme Court.