I am so disillusioned.

[PatrickforB]

83. Yep.

Yes. If the American people were actually smart enough to impose good policies aimed toward that, they would advocate two things that would solve a lot of problems really fast:

A. Force changes in corporate charters requiring a stakeholder approach, wherein the interests of workers, consumers, and the environment were all held coequal with the interests of shareholders. Consider: Since the MI Supreme Court ruling against Henry Ford in 1919, shareholder profits have been king. Ever wonder why so many CEOs are sociopaths? Because if they are doing their jobs well, they will vigorously go about the following immediately upon taking office:
a. Shareholders OVER workers:
i. Bust the union.
ii. Drive wages and benefits down.
iii. Steal the pensions, if they can.
iv. Engage in systematic wage theft, if they can get away with it.
v. Cut costs so working conditions and safety are worse. Think Amazon workers having to pee in bottles because the bathrooms are too far away to get to on break.
vi. Not give workers enough hours so they qualify for benefits.
vii. Pass more and more of the healthcare costs onto the workers by working with the healthcare insurer to impose higher and higher deductibles.
viii. Create an environment of fear amongst workers.
b. Shareholders OVER consumers:
i. Cheapen the component parts to cut cost of sales.
ii. Cut the size of the product but charge the same (Brits call this ‘shrinkflation’).
iii. If the product proves unsafe, calculate whether it is cheaper to just pay out claims for consumers that are maimed or killed, or whether the product ought to be recalled and fixed.
iv. Use excessive and environmentally unfriendly packaging, ostensibly to prevent theft.
v. On monthly services, purposely make the plan so complicated that consumers are confused so you can overcharge them systematically.
vi. If somebody buys the product or service online, trick them into monthly autopays they have to opt out of, and then make it hard to do that.
vii. When a customer calls the ‘care center,’ always try and upsell.
c. Shareholders OVER environment:
i. Foul the environment whenever you can get away with it. If you get caught, try and pass the cost of cleanup to taxpayers.
ii. Pay for pseudoscientific ‘studies’ whose sole purpose is to cast doubt on how you are harming consumers (think big tobacco), or the environment (think big oil’s current effort to sow doubt about global warming).
d. Shareholders OVER the common good:
i. Spend whatever you need to in order to get US Congresspeople elected to both the House and Senate who will vote your way. It costs a few hundred thousand to elect a Representative, and a few million to elect a US Senator. What could possibly be a better investment?
1. Pay ‘think tanks’ like ALEC to draft legislation that will benefit you at local, state and national levels, and use the US Chamber of Commerce and corporate owned media to frame issues in such a way it encourages politicians to vote your way.
2. Pay talk radio hosts to sow dissention and distrust among groups of people, such as different races, people who live in urban and rural areas and so on. Pound in wedges anywhere you can. This gives the people a visible ‘enemy’ so they won’t notice how you are systematically stripping the treasury.
3. If you are about to go out of business or get caught fouling the environment in a big way, try and pass as much of the cost as you can on to consumers.
4. Fight tooth and nail against any new corporate taxes and for the introduction and continuity of loopholes, like the one that allows companies to deduct much of the executive compensation. This has driven executive salaries up into the stratosphere.

So there you have it. Our brand of capitalism SUCKS. If we evened out the tax code so corporations were paying in a fair share of government revenue – right now they pay in only 6.8% of the total collected by IRS, and should pay in around 30-35%. Individual taxpayers like you and I are paying in the lion’s share at 86%. This should be around 45%. In the meantime, the billionaire parasites pay very little in taxes, if any, and it is no surprise they, and corporations, are the ones who benefitted the most from the grossly irresponsible 2017 tax cut.