Public Sentiment and Obama/Congressional Inaction

[KeithE]

by Ralph Nader

There are tens of bills hung up in Congress that are supported by the majority of Americans. Nader mentions several in this article.
- Min Wage Increase (H.R.1010 and S.2223)
- Ending company flight overseas to avoid taxes (H.R.4679 and S.2360) - btw, add your name to
- A tax on financial transactions (H.R. 1579) of 0.1% (most of us pay 5-10% tax on purchases)
- Putting all government contracts on line for public scrutiny (a bill that Senators Obama and Coburn co-sponsored in 2006)

Yet Congress is starting a 5-week recess out of the 12 weeks they get per year.


You see, these bills languish because corporations don’t want them and candidates need money.

[Dave Roberts]

So Congress is only there three weeks out of four. Sounds like a good model to me. Corporations should follow their model and give all employees at least 12 weeks off each year. If it's right for Congress, it should be right for the country

[Mrs Haruo]

We just had our local primary elections for several offices, both for the state house and the congress. With a vacation schedule like that, I can see why there were a number of people running for senate positions who seemed to be more hot air than substance.

[KeithE]

[Sandy]

There is a mistaken impression that if business is given tax breaks, cuts and exemptions, somehow it will lead to the "creation" of jobs, and lower consumer prices. It never does. Well, as far as the jobs go, yes, when American companies outsource, they do create jobs, with cut rate wages exploiting cheap labor in underdeveloped countries. I agree with the President. Not only is it unpatriotic, but if a company moves offshore to avoid paying taxes, the government should immediately slap a tariff on everything they produce and sell, categorizing them as foreign goods, and either collecting what they aren't getting in corporate tax, or force their prices up so high they close.

I don't remember the author's name now, it was a reading assignment in College economics, but there have been warnings for quite some time about allowing corporate contributions to political campaigns and with the potential riches available through the American economy, allowing them to literally "buy" Congress. That's not a new concept in American history, by the way, it has happened all too often. And while the Republicans have been completely caught up in the process, their "values" are a hypocritical joke, and they don't make a move without corporate instruction, the Democrats are also prone to leaning in that direction when they smell the cash. Strict constructionists can easily see how completely and totally unconstitutional corporate contributions to campaigns are, and how far outside the vision of the founding fathers that goes, and that exposes the hypocrisy of conservatives who claim that Obama is ignoring the constitution with his executive orders. He's not, by the way.

America's God is the almighty dollar, and its ethics are built around how to acquire them, regardless of who gets run over in the process. For those who think that nations can incur the wrath of God, that's just as sinful as anything related to "right to life."

[William Thornton]

Dems in search of something, anything that might bail out the fall election.

Oh, and nice Huffpo piece by the union guy Keith linked and quoted above.

[KeithE]

[Sandy]

[William Thornton]

[Sandy]

[William Thornton]

[Sandy]

Do a rundown on the history of what Unions have done for labor. We'd be a third world country like Mexico, with a few fabulously rich, and a lot of poverty, had labor not been a powerful movement. And as its influence has waned, wages have plateaued and the working class is getting robbed blind, via lost wages, and taxes.

[KeithE]

Let the DATA speak.

[William Thornton]

I would be curious about adding a stock market, real dollars, line to that graph.

[KeithE]

[Sandy]

The stock market only reflects the level of prosperity, not who's getting it, or how, or why.

Unions aren't perfect, they have their elements of susceptibility to the same greed and corruption that drives corporate business. But they are an active force that provides the needed balance to keep the power of wealth from artificially driving down wages and the value of labor, and keeps wages market driven and competitive. The value of labor isn't just established by market forces, it is also established by the wealth that it creates. Most businesses wouldn't consider that, unless they are forced to do so.

[William Thornton]

[Sandy]

Showing "real dollars" wouldn't affect the percentages. It's irrelevant. The percentages remain the same.

[KeithE]

[KeithE]

[William Thornton]

"Real" dollars is a basic economic term. You should know this.

[Stephen Fox]

In the last few weeks I have linked Packer on Perlstein in the New Yorker, several reviews of Balmer on Carter with my own commentary and Thornton still holds that Jerry Vines and the takeover fundies were just preaching Jesus.

Packer, Steven Miller, Balmer, you know the roll call make a daming case something else was going on.

And of course NOrm Ornstein on the Lost Soul of the GOP; and Garry Wills on Joe Scarborough's version.

The Tea Party aided and abetted by the Southern Baptist Convention. That's the problem.

[KeithE]

[William Thornton]

Plot the decline of unions against the rise of the stock market in real dollars, one measure of the country's wealth and prosperity. I'm. Not sure what you get but think it might be relevant.

If your preference is for graphs that prove your point then just use those.

[Sandy]

The "real dollars" are irrelevant to the point. The rise of the stock market is not an indication of overall prosperity, and does not reflect circumstances of labor or the prosperity of any particular economic class. The stock market is rising, but wages remain flat, even though labor is a major factor in the increased prosperity. The disparity between what labor is paid, and the prosperity that is limited to the wealthiest economic class is a clear indication of exactly the point we are making, that the value of labor is no longer market driven, but suppressed artificially by the decline of union influence, which is the balance on labor's side to the corporate corruption and greed that channels wealth into few pockets, and exploits the suppression of the value of labor.

"Prosperity" is a subjective concept. The investor class, which is the prosperity that the stock market and the "real dollars" reflect, is much smaller than it once was, and has maneuvered itself into a position where it monopolizes and controls means of production, artificially inflates prices and artificially suppresses the value of labor.

I've used the example of the US steel mill in Weirton, WV before, but it is a great illustration of this point. The corporation was planning to close the mill completely in the early 90's, and lay off 13,000 mill workers. The local steelworkers union negotiated a deal and bought the mill at a relatively low price, since it was considered inefficient and unproductive. With the profits going back to the union members, the steelworkers themselves, in shares of the company that they owned, they were able to produce steel at prices that were competitive with foreign producers. With a worker-owned company, capital investment modernized the mill, the debt vanished in the wave of prosperity that came from increased orders and production, and the mill became one of the few successful American steel manufacturing firms. That lasted for two decades, and with profits going in shares to each mill worker, the mill weathered economic circumstances that put marginal firms out of business.

Of course, corporate business, especially in the steel industry, was horrified at the thought that workers owned the mill they worked for, and they couldn't compete with either the level of productivity, or the prices. Eventually, they infiltrated the union in Weirton through public sale of stock, gained control of the corporate management, and sold the mill to a foreign producer who promptly shut the operation down, leaving only the coke and carbon plans with about 2,000 employees. Of course, the union membership benefited from selling shares that had increased to more than thirty times their original value in the early 90's, while others took the stock options and receive dividends from the foreign company that bought the mill. The community benefited from union generosity and community building, funds for local schools, churches, and the general increase in business atmosphere that weathered the Bush economic recessions. That's what unions do. It is interesting that corporations can give money directly to political campaigns via the citizens united corruption, but unions can only contribute by collecting individual contributions. If corporations qualify as a person with religious convictions, unions should qualify as well.