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Originally posted by LLoyd45
I don't understand why these corporations are entitled to bailouts when they're paying out outrageous severance packages to the same executives that are responsible for their failures.
Why should the little people lose what they have invested, while these corporate executives walk away with multimillion dollar Golden parachutes? Why are they not being held accountable for their mistakes? It should be more like: you're fired, no severance package, no benefits, nada!
...the poverty line will rise and rise like a flood.
PAGE 662 -----------------------------------------------------------
1 gate shall not use the payment of tax described
2 in paragraph (1) as an offset or credit against
3 any tax liability of the applicable partnership or
4 any partner but shall refund such payment to
5 the applicable partnership.
6 (B) NO INTEREST.—The payment described
7 in paragraph (1) shall not be taken into account
8 in determining any amount of interest under
9 such Code.
10 (3) AMOUNT OF DEEMED PAYMENT.—The
11 amount determined under this paragraph for any ap12
plicable taxable year shall be the least of the fol13
lowing:
14 (A) The amount which would be determined
15 for the taxable year under section 168(k)(4)(C)(i)
16 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 (as added
17 by the amendments made by this section) if an
18 election under section 168(k)(4) of such Code
19 were in effect with respect to the partnership.
20 (B) The amount of the credit determined
21 under section 41 of such Code for the taxable
22 year with respect to the partnership.
23 (C) $30,000,000, reduced by the amount of
24 any payment under this subsection for any pre25
ceding taxable year.
PAGE 663 -------------------------------------------------4) DEFINITIONS.—For purposes of this sub23 (A) APPLICABLE PARTNERSHIP.—The term
4 ‘‘applicable partnership’’ means a domestic part5
nership that—
6 (i) was formed effective on August 3,
7 2007, and
8 (ii) will produce in excess of 675,000
9 automobiles during the period beginning on
10 January 1, 2008, and ending on June 30,
11 2008.
Originally posted by bigfatfurrytexan
Its not welfare for corporations. That is completely different.
[edit on 27-7-2008 by bigfatfurrytexan]
Most Americans believe they possess a natural aversion to socialism. Charges of "socialized medicine" have derailed much-needed health care reforms for years.
After all, we are a capitalist society, we believe in personal responsibility, lifting ourselves by our bootstraps -- at least that is the stereotype we like to promote.
The version closer to reality is America offers capitalism to low-income individuals, but is more than willing to unleash its socialist impulses for the wealthy…
As former Treasury Secretary, Lawrence Summers recently opined, "The illusion that the companies (Fannie and Freddie) were doing virtuous work made it impossible to build a political case for serious regulation."
He adds, "When there were social failures the companies always blamed their need to perform for the shareholders. When there were business failures it was always the result of their social obligations."
This leads Summers to conclude that the gains were being privatized and the losses socialized. This is great for the shareholder, but hardly in the best interest of the society as a whole.
"Free trade" policies and the loan sharks that have run the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund have destroyed national economies. Millions of people have been forced into poverty, and entire communities have been displaced from the countryside. Multinationals and northern industrial nations siphon wealth from the developing countries. Those that migrate from their homelands to make a living in the north are greeted with walls, bullets and racism. In the United States, millions are homeless, unemployed, in prison, or one paycheck away from bankruptcy. The social wage has been beaten down to unsustainable levels -- real wages are lower now than they were 30 years ago. Yet the costs of fuel and raw materials have skyrocketed, causing worldwide food shortages. We have wiped out public budgets by eliminating taxes on those who profit most. Vital public infrastructure and services cannot meet basic needs like maintaining the levees in New Orleans and reconstructing the Gulf Coast, or controlling the devastating blazes in Southern California. Yet the majority of our federal budget sponsors the wars and occupation in the Middle East, the warehousing of generations of the poor and people of color, the witch hunt of immigrant refugees of U.S. foreign and trade policy, and the growing national debt.
Capitalism unchecked has given us Big Oil, Blood Diamonds, Enron and Halliburton. They have given us Afghanistan, Iraq, Guantanamo and the Wall of Death on the U.S.-Mexico border.
According to Chomsky, the chasm between "free market fantasies" and "really existing free market theory," that is the one that is actually applied and not talked about, is acute and growing. The dominant political rhetoric of our time states that the poor and working-class must learn responsibility and be subjected to market discipline which is good for building character through tough love. The state should not intervene to help out these folks when they struggling or fail. Conversely, most wealthy individuals and corporations demand a "nanny state" to protect them from market discipline so that they can rant and rave about the marvels of the free market while getting properly subsidized by others through the state. Despite the rhetoric of laissez-faire and free competition, these same wealthy interests demand state aid to minimize competitive risk and help maximize profits. So, if anything goes wrong, the state, through tax dollars, intervenes to bail out the corporation or wealthy individual. In fact, according to Fortune magazine, every single one of the top 100 leading transnational corporations benefited from state intervention on their behalf. Twenty of that 100 were saved from total disaster, meaning collapse, by state bailout. In effect, then, free market ideology is founded on a class-based double-standard.
Amid all the details and statistics that Chomsky presents to back up his views, though, there is a simple, but profound, point at the heart of the argument: There is no such thing as a "free market." Never has been. Never will be. In fact, the government has always interceded in the economy, most consistently on the side of large corporations against the interests of the majority of American citizens. The important question, then, is not whether or not the government should intercede in the economy, but, rather, on whose behalf they should act and toward what end. Chomsky makes clear that "free markets" are intended only for the poor.