US Ivory Towers are Built on Foundations - Which are Cracking
- A Functional Description of Our System
(original 10/29/2010, Dan, Seattle; updated 11/21/2010 to include various debt commission plans.)
"US corporatocracy" - the system of government that serves the interests of, and is essentially run by, corporations. The term describes neoliberalism in its US operational context, with all its components. It primarily seeks to further ties between government and business--where corporations, multinational corporations, conglomerates, and private parties including political organizations and highly-paid corporate executives are the primary controls, and are the elite. Areas of control rely on direction and governance often tied to contrived (sometimes fearsome) mass-media visages of issues, ideas, and persons within the nation. Within the corporatocracy, objective news reporting is hard to find. The system depends on highly-paid "pundits" for dissemination of major themes--these themes are often repetitive and divisive. Moreover, pundits distract the public from the critical issues, facts, and figures they should be focusing on. Often times these pundits--such as Glenn Beck, with basically a high school education--flat out misrepresent or lie...and millions of Americans are taken in. Thus, the shady activities of the corporatocracy go largely unnoticed.
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Not surprisingly, in the corporatocracy, unemployment is high even during boom periods where corporate profits are rich and the stock market is high, because of a reliance on offshoring and offshore investment. The corporations always seek out what's known in economic terms as "absolute advantage," which in lay terms means "utter selfishness and disregard for the rest of the US." The corporatocracy cares less about retaining jobs than foreign counterparts, largely due to the influence of the US Chamber of Commerce. The US tax base is eroded as a consequence--those that profit the most in the corporatocracy aren't taxed--and the federal debt climbs quickly, since the US budget system relies heavily on non-corporate federal income tax receipts. In short--no jobs means no balanced budget. And yet the Chamber persists in its anti-US-job agenda--and America lets it. Are people protesting the Chamber in the streets, and demanding they desist? I haven't seen them.
As part of its operating model, the corporatocracy generates an increasing number of offshore holding companies, which route US direct investment abroad ("DIA"), first through the EU, and then through yet other entities...finally allowing the widespread propagation of offshored business into low-wage countries like China, India, and Brazil--with low US tax consequences. In addition, the US also offers tax incentives for offshoring--destroying its own tax base. But as for the DIA, up to and throughout the current recession, the rate of growth of DIA in EU holding companies has been brisk. This DIA activity means foreign investment and offshoring has become the "new bubble"--as an alternative to US job creation. It's a bubble because it has disconnected the economic model of capitalism from the welfare and fiscal sustainability of the US. ...
Full:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x9606525
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