http://www.red-ice.net/news/2006/09sep/gcarlin.html

Were you born yesterday, or what?

You obviously don’t understand much about business and economics. In this day, corporations that ignore the needs of their customers and employees, as well as the needs of the communities they are situated in, stand a good chance of failing. The needs of customers, employees, communities and the need for the corporation to be profitable are all related to each other in the modern corporation. Increasing our involvement in the global economy, especially through free trade, will go a long way toward helping the people of poor countries lift themselves out of poverty. Unlike in the mafia, trade is based on voluntary interaction between willing parties.

What is conspicuously absent from any of your comments so far are solutions to any of the problems you have brought up. You have only attacked what you perceive are the shortcomings of the free market. I suggest you offer some solutions.

It took me about 2 minutes using google.com to find out that the factory Michael Moore sited was closed by health inspectors, not the corporation.

An example of a company closing a profitable factory was given in Michael Moore’s “The Big One”. As I remember, it was a Hershey candy bar factory in I think Missouri.

Today, corporate philosophy is that only return to investors is important to the corporation. There is no consideration of the corporation being a part of a larger community including workers and people in the community where corporation activities are carried out.

Corporations represent the oligarchy which thinks it can live in its ivory tower cut off from the hoi poloi. The oligarchy sees its workers and citizens in general as expendable “resources”. Basically, the corporation is a sort of authorized mafia.

It is hard to see how many of the lower 40% of the population which has less than one percent of the national wealth can participate in pensions to any significant degree. One example,

” The Dow component said the defined benefit pension program will continue for current employees with future accruals at a reduced level with the calculation unchanged for service accrued through 2007 and then reduced to one-third its current level for service accrued after 2007.”

” Also, DuPont noted its company-paid survivor benefit will not continue to grow after Dec. 31, 2007, and that new hires effective Jan. 1, 2007 won’t be eligible for the pension and retirement plan, only the enhanced savings plan, and they will not receive a company subsidy for retiree healthcare or retiree life insurance.”

” DuPont anticipates the changes will improve earnings by about 3 cents a share in 2007, and by about 5 cents per share beginning in 2008. The stock closed Friday at $39.25, down 20 cents.”

http://www.smartmoney.com/bn/ON/index.cfm?story=ON-20060828-000231-0943

It is not only pensions, but health care that are cut.

“The percentage of people with job-based health insurance dropped again last year, helping push up the level of uninsured Americans to 15.9% of the population, the highest since 1998.

Estimates released Tuesday by the Census Bureau show that 46.6 million people lacked health insurance in 2005, up from 45.3 million in 2004. Unlike in other recent years, there was no increase in the rate of enrollment in government-based programs, such as Medicaid, which had helped to offset declines in private insurance.

Job-based health insurance, which is the way most Americans get their coverage, began falling in 2001, even as health insurance premiums rose at double-digit annual rates. Last year, premium growth averaged 9.2%, lower than in previous years, but still three times inflation. ”

http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/health/2006-08-29-health-insurance-coverage_x.htm

That is nonsense. Corporations don’t generally close a profitable factory unless they are able to reinvest in a factory that is more profitable than the one being closed. Any profit is better than no profit at all. Perhaps you meant to say something along this line. My point here is that sensible corporations want to maximize their profits. That is their main reason for existing.

You seem to disapprove of corporations maximizing their profits. Why shouldn’t they? Investors have every right to expect as large of a return as they can get from their investments. Consider that millions of Americans of all income levels have pensions that are invested in corporations all over the world. Their standard of living in retirement is going to be dependent, in good measure, on how well these corporations maximize their profits between now and then. And don’t tell me that poor people can’t participate in pensions. I have many low income clients that participate in pensions, through their employers and through self-funded plans. These low income people, more than anyone else, are counting on their pension plans to serve them well in retirement.

Do you really not know what “jeopardize the competitive position” means, or are you just pretending to be ignorant for the sake of an argument?

What does that mean, “jeopardize the competitive positions”? “Competitive position” is a myth created by the corporate oligarchy to justify keeping workers in their place. Now it is often used as a justification for closing plants in one country and setting up in another that has a more “competitive” workforce, naturally paid much less.

Corporations often close profitable factories because they are only bringing in say a 6% return when the Wall Street financial analysts are demanding say a 10% return.

What is the result of more than a hundred years of this policy? Extreme inequality in individual wealth.

http://www.faculty.fairfield.edu/faculty/hodgson/Courses/so11/stratification/income&wealth.htm

“These data suggest that wealth is concentrated in the hands of a small number of families. The wealthiest 1 percent of households owns roughly 33.4% of the nation’s net worth, the top 10% of households owns over 71%, and the bottom 40% of households owns less than 1%.”

I noticed that all of the Memphis sanitation workers pictured are African-American. I also noticed that the picture was taken in 1968. I believe things are quite different now (not perfect, but better).

On the other hand, I’ve been involved in investigations of labor unions where the power to hire and fire was clearly abused (and for which convictions of labor leaders were achieved).

I’m opposed to abuse of people. Unions are powerful forces in preventing and stopping abuse of workers. Most right-to-work laws as applied keep workers from organizing for better work conditions, or safety.

See the photo of the Memphis Sanitation Workers. See their slogan: “I am a MAN.” The City of Memphis refused to even negotiate with the workers, who were making less than $1.00 (if memory serves correctly), with horrible work conditions. They picked up garbage with their bare hands, in the summer’s heat, in the winter’s cold . . . Officials refused to negotiate with them because, they said, state laws said they didn’t have to negotiate with unions. Notice that all of the workers pictured are African-American.

Do you think that garbage workers should not have the right to be treated as humans? Should they not have the right to demand fair wages, safe and secure work conditions, and to be treated as humans? How do right-to-work laws help the Memphis Sanitation Workers? How do they help anyone else?