Thursday, March 26, 2015

TPP: Even Worse Than We Thought

Not only are they secretly planning to take over the world, they were actually planning to keep us all in the dark about their multiple coups d'etat for four years. In four years -- or so the latest leaked document claims -- they were finally going to let us all know we'd been robbed. How very noble of them.

 Somehow, the corporations and their political lackeys thought that the widespread replacement of legislatures and judiciaries with private corporate tribunals would go unnoticed, for four long years. The estimated one third of the world's population to be victimized would remain unaware of why they were losing their jobs, their savings, their environments and their very lives.

Meanwhile, the people doing the plotting have to be fully aware of how criminally diseased the Trans-Pacific Partnership truly is by slapping a four-year moratorium on public release of the now-leaked portion of the contents.

  By classifying their coup as a national security secret, they admit that they'll never be able to claim that "mistakes were made." Because the people negotiating this deal are acting deliberately. Every bit as deliberately as the pilot who allegedly crashed the German plane into a mountain the other day.  The only difference is that the negotiators piloting this hellish coup-deville will survive their own recklessness. But only for a little while. For when wealth and power are concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, the whole edifice is bound to collapse from its own top-heavy weight.

Apparently, the TPP plotters thought that suing governments in dispute resolution tribunals and then winning their cases by default would enable them to collect their final judgments from us without our knowledge. They'd never even have to serve us with a subpoena. We would be denied our day in court to act in our own defense. The money would just magically disappear from our pockets and bank accounts, and we'd be none the wiser.

 The thieving pathocrats would do what they always do: lecture us and poor-shame us. We didn't save enough for retirement. We lived beyond our means. We didn't eat healthy foods. We didn't develop the necessary skills to survive in the New Abnormal Economy (aka the Plutonomy.)

But now, thanks to Wikileaks, we know the truth. Whenever an undemocratic government classifies a document, it's to keep the corruption hidden and the rest of us ignorant. So, passing this deal from hell just got a little bit harder for them. When even the New York Times can no longer ignore the criminality, President Obama's astroturf propaganda campaign, sold as a renegotiation of NAFTA and a middle class, progressive triumph, will have to come up with some brand new bullshit in a hurry. Senator Ron Wyden, Obama's main Democratic co-conspirator in getting fast track approval authority rammed through Congress, is being threatened with a primary challenge.

Public Citizen explains all the newly-leaked horror of a global tribunal system run amok, by plutocrats:
Enactment of the leaked chapter would increase U.S. ISDS liability to an unprecedented degree by newly empowering about 9,000 foreign-owned firms from Japan and other TPP nations operating in the United States to launch cases against the government over policies that apply equally to domestic and foreign firms. To date, the United States has faced few ISDS attacks because past ISDS-enforced pacts have almost exclusively been with developing nations whose firms have few investments here.
The leak reveals that the TPP would replicate the ISDS language found in past U.S. agreements under which tribunals have ordered more than $3.6 billion in compensation to foreign investors attacking land use rules; water, energy and timber policies; health, safety and environmental protections; financial stability policies and more. And while the Obama administration has sought to quell growing concerns about the ISDS threat with claims that past pacts’ problems would be remedied in the TPP, the leaked text does not include new safeguards relative to past U.S. ISDS-enforced pacts. Indeed, this version of the text, which shows very few remaining areas of disagreement, eliminates various safeguard proposals that were included in a 2012 leaked TPP Investment Chapter text.
“With the veil of secrecy ripped back, finally everyone can see for themselves that the TPP would give multinational corporations extraordinary new powers that undermine our sovereignty, expose U.S. taxpayers to billions in new liability and privilege foreign firms operating here with special rights not available to U.S. firms under U.S. law,” said Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch. “This leak is a disaster for the corporate lobbyists and administration officials trying to persuade Congress to delegate Fast Track authority to railroad the TPP through Congress.”
In the past three years alone, at least 150 ISD cases have been launched under the much smaller trade agreements which are currently in effect.  Investors have, for example, already attacked Canada's patent medicine and fracking policies and Australia's anti-smoking policy. Chevron has dodged responsibility for despoiling the Ecuadorian ecosystem with its toxic oil. Under the TPP, American taxpayers would theoretically not only be on the hook for cleaning up the next major oil spill, it would end up owing multinational oil giants many more billions in lost profits. Crooked politicians like New Jersey Governor Chris Christie would never even have to make another sweetheart deal with Exxon Mobil. Polluters would avoid being sued, either criminally or civilly, in the first place.  And then they'd be able to collect cash damages under the table without so much as an embarrassing press release.

All perfectly legal. All perfectly tax-free. All perfectly corrupt. A shadow legal system is just what the shadow banking system needs to complete the global coup.

It's no accident that Michael Froman of Citigroup, President Obama's chief trade negotiator,  pocketed a multimillion dollar "exit bonus" from his employer to complete the dirty deed. Or that Bank of America gifted Stefan Selig with a $9 million severance package when he went to work for Obama's commerce secretary, billionaire Obama donor Penny Pritzker.

So let's stop them in their tracks. Tell your congress critter to say No to fast track authority for Barack Obama and the global mafia. Because the last I heard, we're still allowed to vote amongst all the variants of greater and lesser evil. Let's cling to the remaining tatters of democracy as tenaciously as they accuse people of clinging to their guns and religion.


23 comments:

Meredith NYC said...

What is the pushback to TPP among certain influential liberals? Just when we need all the allies to mount an opposition. I must cite Krugman –self named ‘conscience of a liberal’ –who says:
“ I am in general a free trader”, in blog re TPP “Suspicious Nonsense on Trade Agreements”. January 19, 2015.
(why he has to use semi colons I don’t know---lest we misinterpret?)

He says......“I am in general a free trader; there is, I’d argue, a tendency on the part of some people with whom I agree on many issues to demonize trade agreements, to make them responsible for evils that have other causes. And my take on both of the trade agreements currently under negotiation — Pacific and Atlantic — is that there’s much less there than meets the eye.”
(meaning what....awfully wordy).

A commenter said---of course, there’s ‘much less than meets the eye,’ since we can’t read them---they’re fast tracked in secret!

Then PK says he's suspcious of TPP just b/c the Chamber of Commerce wants it. That’s his main basis of distrust, I think.

Karen, and anyone.....You might take a look at his blog post and see if you can grasp where he’s coming from. Any explanation is appreciated from me, a non economist.

When a Nobel liberal honors the op ed page 2X/week, people are influenced. So if he misleads, or weakly defends against the rw, it can do more damage than the rw crazy michigas does itself.

But, there were many negative and informative comments to that blog. For example re EU attitudes:

“TTIP has widespread opposition in Europe. A European Citizens Initiative opposing TTIP outright has been signed by over 1,200,000 people The last EU-wide poll I have heard of had 97% of respondents rejecting the treaty.”

Not sure of the pct of Americans against.

Pearl said...

Meredith: How can you believe some of the things that Krugman says. I cringed everytime he defended Obamacare knowing the facts. Any kind of investigation from many sources would have revealed the truth about its operation and how can he state his position when he obviously was listening to explanations from the perpetrators. When someone can lie for such a big issue, he can easily do so for other equally important issues even if he does it delicately trying to appear knowledgeable. People like Krugman that try to appear as caring and liberal and then report things in a major column in a major newspaper aiding those who are obviously gaining their own destructive perks, are the true betrayers of the people. So how do you expect him to tell the truth about the TPP which is clearly (even without the actual details from Karen and others)so obvious even to those of us who are not economists.
One wonders if it is true ignorance, intellectual laziness, or real greed and dishonesty. I choose the latter.

Meredith NYC said...

Pearl....30 lashes with a wet noodle if i believe anything Krugman says or expect anything but lies from him?

I think it's educational to discuss where he misleads readers to try to get at the truth---re ACA or TPP, etc.M

I did say......So if he misleads, or weakly defends against the rw, it can do more damage than the rw crazy michigas does itself.
What do you want?

Valerie Long Tweedie said...

Karen,

I really hope this essay goes viral, it certainly needs to! The more we learn - and we are able to know so little - the worse the TPP gets. I don't want to sound melodramatic but it sure sounds like the end of democracy (as we know it - that is a government for the people) to me. If a corporation can sue even a local government, it is going to have a huge effect on whether or not they will pass legislation that protects labour, health or the environment.

And it all seems quite scary to me. We just had a big scare in Australia over toxic frozen blueberries from China. With the TPP, we will have no control over what foods are sold to us. Right now, parliamentarians are discussing whether or not we should have symbols on our packaged food showing how much of the product comes from Australia. Many believe it is the consumer's right to know. THAT kind of information (and legislation) will go by the wayside with the TPP. Our government will be afraid to pass a law like that for fear of being sued in a foreign tribunal. After all, that kind of information will cause consumers not to buy a corporation's toxic product and will cut into their expected profits.

I think it is appalling how the Europeans have managed to get over a million signatures protesting the TTIP (the TPP with Europe) and in the U.S. there is barely a rattle.

Obama is a Trojan horse, just as Clinton was. The last decent democratic president we have had is Jimmy Carter. There are a handful of decent democrats in Congress: Elizabeth Warren, Alan Grayson, Sherrod Brown - but most are carrying water for Obama. It is discouraging.

As for Kruggie - He's clearly gone over to the dark side. There are trade agreements - which we should definitely pursue, ones which are fair and beneficial to both sides - and then there is "Free" Trade which seems to simply benefit the giant corporations. The fact that Kruggie is downplaying the significance of this and the cost to the middle class shows he has been corrupted.

I will definitely go over to read Kruggie - not for his take on things but more to read the reader comments. As is with so many of the NYT writers, I learn more from the commenters than I do from the opinion writers.

I agree that writers like Kruggie and Nicholas Kristof are dangerous to democracy. I have so many liberal friends who read and trust these guys to be knowledgeable and ethical. They accept them at face value and trust what they write. Personally, the fact that the NYT has been so silent on the issue of the TPP is telling - even Wikipedia tells what the critics of the TPP are concerned about.

VLT said...

I just went over and checked out the blog/article TPP at the NABE. If you click on the comments and then go to "reader picks" there are quite a few excellent comments.

Kruggie is luke-warm in his "thumbs down" but at least he is saying no. Robert Reich is much more convincing - and I respect Reich a lot more than I do Kruggie.

Karen Garcia said...

I'm of two minds about Krugman.

On the plus side, he explains economic principles very well to the layperson. His charts are to die for.

On the minus side, he is stuck in partisan politics. He echoes Democratic Party talking points. Some of his rhetoric comes straight from the White House propaganda shop. As in today's column, which right off the bat correlates Obamacare with an increase in jobs, as if Obamacare were a universal plan and the actual jobs were simply great. As I remarked in my reply to Meredith's reply to my Times comment today, Krugman totally ignores the corruption, instead preferring to chalk it up to GOP stupidity and "Obama Derangement Syndrome." Anybody can write stuff like that. Gail Collins does it twice a week.

I don't disbelieve every word Krugman says. I just note the lying by omission.

Denis Neville said...

Reich is just another establishment liberal.

Both Krugman and Reich own shares in the veal pen. Their job as shills and propagandists is to hold our hand as we are led off to the veal pen.

The Democrats as a party are neoconservative and neoliberal as are Obama and the Clintons.

“Don’t believe them, don’t fear them, don’t ask anything of them” - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

From Robert Reich's Facebook page:

“If Hillary Clinton or any other Democrat wins the White House next year, Barack Obama should be their first Supreme Court pick. He's been a constitutional law professor. He has the right temperament and values. He's a superb writer. The average age of newly appointed justices is 53; Obama will be 55 on leaving office. Even a Republican Senate would be hard-pressed not to confirm a former president. There are precedents (William Howard Taft was appointed to the Court after his presidency).”

https://www.facebook.com/RBReich/posts/966335810045682

Now that’s a scary thought!

Meredith NYC said...

Karen....Yes, I caught Nomi Prins on an RT interview the other night—didn’t she used to work for Goldman or one of the big banks? She’s very good, maybe I’ll look at her book---and read Morgenson more.

I’m glad you stated this: “There are virtually no Times op-ed writers left who are speaking up for the ordinary people that neoliberalism has left behind.” That says it very frankly.

If this takes some Times readers aback, it’s only b/c Krugman is the liberal Nobel star of the Times, due to lower standards of what a true liberal should be saying.

Don’t think Reich and Krugman are so similar.

I sent this reply to a reply telling me to read Krugman regularly:

Reading Krugman regularly I compare him to other liberals regularly. I see that he does not agree with some of them on important points, such as Warren on the destructiveness of campaign finance as a primary cause of many of our problems, and on huge student debt affecting the economy.

And he disagrees with Stiglitz on how inequality is a drag on national economic growth itself. And disagrees with Reich, etc, generally on how free trade is bad for workers.

We need our economist columnist to face the fact that many countries manage to achieve higher min wage without breaking their small business, plus real h/c for all not some, plus free or low cost higher ed. Just rah rah for ACA won't do it, when millions of 2nd class citizens are left out.

Such contrasts and how they're financed should be explained and contrasted to give US voters a way to challenge our lawmakers of both parties.

I agree one of the biggest scandals is taxpayers directly subsidizing the profitability of big employers. How did we come to this? Lack of a true opposition party, for starters. It ain't all big bad Repubs, bad as they are and as richly as they deserve scorn.

Left undiscussed is how the Dems have been dragged to the right. Can't get unstuck without admitting we're being shortchanged, how and by whom.

Meredith NYC said...

Karen, I've also been of 2 minds re Krugman. He's been superb at refuting the rw crazies with lovely data-based sarcasm. But that just makes his omissions all the more harmful.

Now I've realized his 'avoidance syndrome'. Mostly after I saw his talk with Eliz Warren on TV and after I attended his talk at Hunter college. I sent up an audience question re the contrast between us and other advanced countries in financing h/c, education and elections. His answer was weirdly inadequate--mainly bringing up Greece, that's it. A perfect avoidance example. It was almost embarrassing.

Because the EU nations have all cut budgets, he constantly spotlights that to push his keynsian views and rightly so. But he leaves out that their austerity is not our austerity. They start at a higher spending level, so the consequences are not so severe on average citizens. This crucial point he never mentions in columns, so he can just scold the budget cutters. He must feel to give EU nations any credit at all will totally undercut his criticizing of austerity--or something. Can't figure it out.

Jay–Ottawa said...

Fat Cat Carlos Slim, who continues to gouge the Mexican people through his near monopoly of their/his telephone system, has once again been crowned the richest man in the world. Midas lives. It would take more than $80 billion for you to pull ahead of him in that stupid race.

In January of this year, Slim became the biggest shareholder of the NY Times, doubling his initial investment of a few years back. The Times seems to have found favor with Midas. This is not to say that the Times is now his mouthpiece all the time on every subject––only some of the time and where it counts.

Are we still puzzled about why things turn out as they do, why some things are said and other things not said, or reported in the form of whispers from afar?

Like most politicians, cons and trolls, the Times puts out a lot of good stuff. Even to the point of, once in a while, saying something half-heartedly critical about our wars, our financial system, our security binges, our health system, and all the other hypocrisies of the exceptional nation. This is how we are lulled into thinking the Times still has cred, as well as polish, as the journal of record.

Over the long haul, however, a blind person should be able to see the slant of the Times. Its vices in service to money intrude, or stand aside, at important moments on key subjects. The bottom line over the past twenty years (at least) is that it has supported foolish wars––and still does. It has not shed enough light on politicians, bankers, spies and generals––and still doesn’t.

What you do know in the way of substantive truth on key issues has been told to you by blogs on the margin, like this one. As for the Times’ bottom line service to the nation as a “thought leader,” “civic conscience” or “journal of record,” it has not helped the majority of Americans live free and decent lives––and still doesn't. It still supports, ever so subtly, those who climb higher on the charts of disparity as well as those in service to money who are good at killing, whether by the fire of bombs or the ice of poverty.

To maintain their integrity, journalists like Chris Hedges and James Risen have had to butt heads with top executives at the Times. Krugman, on the other hand, fits right in year after year. He maintains the perfect pitch to hang on to clueless progressives while pleasing the likes of Carlos Slim. Krugman has the right stuff to be a big contender, but he keeps pulling his punches. And we wonder why.

Zee said...

For all the good that it will do, I have e-mailed New Mexico's three ObamaBot sock puppets—Udall, Heinrich and Lujan-Grisham—and asked them to oppose the TTP and TTIP.

But for my money, “guns” and “religion” are better bets than “democracy” as things we are likely to be able to enjoy much in the future.

Valerie said...

Denis,

My bad for not reading more of what Reich is writing. I was basing my opinion on Reich's stance on the TPP and his belief that policies of austerity are terrible for economies. I also read stuff he wrote on labour and it was very supportive. I also assumed he left the Clinton Administration because of ideological differences - mainly NAFTA. But perhaps I gave him credit where it wasn't deserved.

You have set me straight! Anyone who is backing Hillary is not my kind of liberal.

I come to this blog to learn and to improve my understanding of the issues and those in power. I appreciate that kind of relevant feedback.

Meredith NYC said...

I must comment again on Krugman’s late blog post defending ACA against rw attack . His graph shows the decrease in the uninsured over years. No mention of the still uninsured and the various reasons. Then he argues about who are the supposed victims of ACA horror stories per Repub complaints. Or I think that’s it, not sure. So I commented:

All I can do is shake my head in dismay. How pathetic that we have to compare and weigh horror stories! Why are there ANY victims? Why must we decide who are the real victims, or the most or least unfortunate ones? This shows what a low standard we have in 2015 USA.

Why not compare us to the nations where the percentage of uncovered citizens is ZERO? I'm curious, If you did that Dr. Krugman, what would be the consequences? You might be even more criticized by the right wing, but so what? I thought you find that quite stimulating, judging from your constant blog posts filled with retorts to them.

So I ask, if you compared us to the dozens of other democracies world wide, all with various health systems that cover all at lower cost, instead of to our own backward, atrocious health care past, what exactly would result? It's a mystery. Unless you want to support Obama no matter what. No, I can only speculate.

Where are your graphs that truly reveal how we haven't even reached 20th C parity with the rest of the advanced world? Plot the number of medical bankruptcies among countries--USA, millions vs abroad, zero--as reported by NY Times.

Such a graph would reveal one of the major reasons our equality and middle class security has over decades been lower than all those countries whose austerity you keep criticizing.

Pear; said...

Karen: just sending this in to check if it goes through properly. I think I pressed google account under choose an identity by mistake in my previous comment that did not go through.
Great comments from everyone.

Meredith NYC said...

Karen, Here are 2 gems of satire by Andy Borowitz, so apt for the “Cruse Missile” running to be leader of the Free World.

I put them into Gail Collins comments last night re her Ted Cruz column, but neither were published! My other comments were. How strange---they sure are on topic. But she could never write anything half as funny.


“President Signs Order Making Ted Cruz Ineligible for Obamacare.
March 25. (this is accompanied by a photo of Obama signing a paper, and looking very grave and presidential).

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report) — Just hours after Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) told CNN that he had no choice but to sign up for Obamacare, President Barack Obama signed an executive order making Cruz ineligible for coverage under the Affordable Care Act.

“Clearly, the hardship of receiving Obamacare was causing Ted a great deal of pain,” the President said. “This should take care of that.”

Obama acknowledged that the executive order, which makes Cruz the only American expressly forbidden from signing up for Obamacare, was an extraordinary measure, but added, “I felt it was a necessary humanitarian gesture to protect Ted from the law he hates.”

Even as he signed the order, the President said that he was “torn” about barring Cruz from coverage, stating,”He’s definitely someone who would benefit from seeing a doctor.”

and

MARCH 22, 2015
Disturbed Man Tries to Get Into White House
BY ANDY BOROWITZ

“WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report) – A disturbed Canadian man wants to try to get into the White House, according to reports.

The man, who was born in Calgary before drifting to Texas, has been spotted in Washington, D.C. in recent years exhibiting erratic behavior, sources said.


In 2013, he gained entry to the United States Senate and was heard quoting incoherently from a children’s book before he was finally subdued.

More recently, he was heard ranting about a plan to dismantle large components of the federal government, such as the Internal Revenue Service and the nation’s health-care program.

Despite a record of such bizarre episodes and unhinged utterances, observers expressed little concern about his plans to get into the White House, calling them “delusional.”

Zee said...

Nobel Prize in Economics, Part I

“On the plus side, [Paul Krugman] explains economic principles very well to the layperson. His charts are to die for.” —Karen Garcia (My bold emphasis.)

So much of Krugman's attraction for the American political liberal (and, yes, the American political progressive too) attaches to (1) his status as a Nobel laureate, and (2) the fact that he reliably says those special things that liberals so desperately want to have whispered in their ears.

The one “fact” regularly burnishes the other, no?

As a Nobelist, Krugman just has to be hugely smart and worth listening to, right? And, of course, he will never, ever, tell a liberal that her/his first black president has been an abject failure. Hence, Krugman's idolization by the left; even progressives in this forum seem to shed a tear of regret when they are occasionally forced to criticize him.

But then, Barack Obama is a Nobel laureate, too, and we all see how much his Nobel Peace Prize is reflective of his actual accomplishments in the name of “peace,” viz., NONE AT ALL! So much for any guaranteed value of a Nobel Prize, then...

So what's the real value of a Nobel Prize in Economics, I asked myself?

In a casual researching of the Nobel Prize in Economics, I found the following from Wikipedia to be interesting; though, as always not necessarily definitive:

“The Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (officially Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel...), commonly (but erroneously) referred to as the Nobel Prize in Economics, and as a 'category of the Nobel Prize' by the Nobel Foundation itself which owns the tradename 'Nobel Prize', is an award for outstanding contributions to the field of economics, and generally regarded as the most prestigious award for that field. It is not one of the prizes established by the will of Alfred Nobel in 1895, but instead was established 73 years later by Sweden's central bank, the Sveriges Riksbank, on the occasion of the bank's 300th anniversary with a donation to the Foundation. Winners are announced on the same day as other Nobel Prize winners, and receive the award at the same ceremony...”

[So the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, ain't really a Nobel Prize at all. It's a late-comer, trading on Alfred Nobel's name but established by the Swedish banking industry in 1968.]

“Some critics argue that the prestige of the Prize in Economics derives in part from its association with the Nobel Prizes, an association that has often been a source of controversy. Among them is the Swedish human rights lawyer Peter Nobel, a great-grandson of Ludvig Nobel. Nobel criticizes the awarding institution of misusing his family's name, and states that no member of the Nobel family has ever had the intention of establishing a prize in economics."

[So some members of the Nobel family disavow the award altogether.]

Zee said...

Nobel Prize in Economics, Part II

"'According to Samuel Brittan of the Financial Times, both of the former Swedish ministers of finance, Kjell-Olof Feldt and Gunnar Myrdal, wanted the prize abolished, saying, 'Myrdal rather less graciously wanted the prize abolished because it had been given to such reactionaries as Hayek (and afterwards Milton Friedman).'

[Suggests to me that the award is as much 'political' as 'intellectual.' How dare the prize committee give the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences to 'reactionaries?' There can't be any smart reactionaries, can there, so let's abolish the prize?]

In his speech at the 1974 Nobel Prize banquet Friedrich Hayek stated that had he been consulted on the establishment of a Nobel Prize in economics, he would 'have decidedly advised against it' primarily because 'the Nobel Prize confers on an individual an authority which in economics no man ought to possess.... This does not matter in the natural sciences. Here the influence exercised by an individual is chiefly an influence on his fellow experts; and they will soon cut him down to size if he exceeds his competence. But the influence of the economist that mainly matters is an influence over l\ laymen: politicians, journalists, civil servants and the public generally.'”
(My bold emphases.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobel_Memorial_Prize_in_Economic_Sciences

So Hayek seems to implicitly acknowledge what I have maintained all along. “Economics” is not a “science.” It's a “curve-fitting” exercise to historical information, some of which may have been “pre-massaged” or “ cherry-picked” into unrecognizability in order to obtain the investigator's preordained, hoped-for, result-cum-prediction. And unlike “results” from the physical sciences, economic “results” are untestable, merely subjects of endless debates and intended mostly to influence “politicians, journalists, civil servants and the public generally.”

Caveat emptor.

annenigma said...

I got this info from an article by my hero, Ralph Nader. It's a useful tool to track the corporate welfare parasites who are sucking money out of taxpayers and which programs they're using to get their fix. It's called 'Subsidy Tracker' from the website www.goodjobsfirst.org.

'Discover Where Corporations are Getting Taxpayer Assistance Across the United States.

http://www.goodjobsfirst.org/subsidy-tracker

Patricia M. said...

annenigma -
The site you provided contains a wealth of information . . . . one could spend days with it . . . . It's a real eye opener. One knows - but really does not know - until specific information like this is made available.

'Discover Where Corporations are Getting Taxpayer Assistance Across the United States.

http://www.goodjobsfirst.org/subsidy-tracker

It's tragic that at least some local and national news organizations don't publish information like this. Thank you for the link.

Valerie said...

Great link, Anne, thanks,
Valerie

Karen Garcia said...

I'm taking a break from Krugman. Life is too short.

Many thanks for pointing us to Nader's site, Anne. I'm adding it to the Blogroll.

Zee said...

@annenigma-

My thanks for the link to the subsidy-tracker, as well.

As Patricia M. said, one could spend days studying and digesting the data.

The size of some of the tax breaks/subsidies is truly breathtaking.

Meredith NYC said...

Karen....Eliz Warren was at the NY Barnes and Noble at Union Square this weekend, selling the paperback edition of ‘A Fighting Chance’. Likely a big crowd.

And maybe good use of your time not to bother with PK today. All he did was repeat his usual-- let’s be thankful for ACA, yet again. I am thinking he’s compulsive, Sunday, he felt he had to explain why he kept blogging, b/c he was home with a cold, so why not, he said. The guy can’t help it. I said we’re all getting too addicted.

Re tax payer subsidies of private corporations....i wonder what is the difference between effective so called ‘private/ public partnerships’ vs corporations using taxpayer money for excessive profits that don’t benefit the public. I don’t really know how to phrase it. When do public/private partnerships work?

With propaganda about free enterprise vs socialism, we really get socialism for private corporations, not for us. A neat trick. Isn’t that what the charter school mvmt is? Why are hedge funds it’s big investors?

An example (which krugman never touches) is taxpayers subsidizing health insurance company profits thru ACA—an unequal ‘partnership’ I’d say. Any thoughts or clarifications appreciated.

EU has partnerships, but with regulation—unacceptable, even heretical here.