Fwd: [blind-democracy] Why Does Amazon Get Corporate Welfare?

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Carl Jarvis <carjar82@gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2017 08:06:06 -0700
Subject: Re: [blind-democracy] Why Does Amazon Get Corporate Welfare?
To: blind-democracy@freelists.org

Question: Why does Amazon get Corporate Welfare?
Answer: Because Amazon is too wealthy to qualify for regular Welfare.

Frankly, I'm fed up listening to these huge corporations accusing the
lazy "Welfare Moms", and the "Ne'er Do Wells", of living off the fat
of the land.
The biggest welfare recipients, those who are getting the fattest off
our tax dollars, are the giant corporations. Just take a moment and
close your ears to their whining claims that your little apartment or
tar paper shack is where the tax dollars go, and look at their life
style. Then ask yourself, "Do I really enjoy supporting these people,
while I'm getting goose bumps from the cold air leaking through my
shanty walls? "Do I really get some secret pleasure from fighting
traffic going to and from my job, while my tax dollars are paying for
those fancy choppers that drop my boss off on the company roof?"
Do we really enjoy the feeling that everything we own, that we have
worked for, can be taken away from us if the Ruling Class desires it?
You say that it can't happen? Sorry, it has been going on all around
us for many years. And we don't need to go back to the huge land
grants our government gave to the railroads. Who do you think pays
when the government gives away our land, or special tax breaks to
businesses? And usually the jobs provided by these businesses are
funded at a level that keeps the workers in low income status. And
when your community condemns property to develop a new mall, or to
build a school, or to expand a highway, the little individual property
owners get short changed while the large investors rake in the
profits...your tax dollars.
We live in a System that is established to care for the needs of the
Ruling Class. This is why they are called, "The Ruling Class!" Under
the Ruling Classes government, sharing the wealth is not in their
vocabulary. Profit is the bottom line, and they share only as little
as it takes to keep the dollars rolling in.
While some of us have "done better" than others, All Working Class
People live at the mercy of the Elite, the Ruling Class.

Carl Jarvis




On 11/1/17, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@optonline.net> wrote:
> Why Does Amazon Get Corporate Welfare?
> Published on
> Wednesday, November 01, 2017
> by
> Creators.com
> Why Does Amazon Get Corporate Welfare?
> Not satisfied with just taking your money, Bezos is coming after your tax
> dollars as well.
> by
> Jim Hightower
>
> "Uber-rich Amazon doesn't need and certainly doesn't deserve this giveaway,
> but officials in 238 cities have prostrated themselves in front of the
> welfare queen in an embarrassing bid to win her nod."
>
> Canonicalized/flickr/cc)
>
> Jeffrey Preston Bezos is the man of unbounded ambition who founded Amazon,
> the online retailing colossus that trumpets itself as "Earth's most
> customer-centric company." He's considered a model of tech wizardry for
> having totally reinvented retail marketing for our smart-phone,
> globally-linked age. Amazon peddles a cornucopia of goods through a
> convenient "1-click" ordering system, rapidly delivering the goods right to
> your doorstep.
> No one has imagined corporate domination more expansively nor pushed it
> harder or further than Bezos, and his Amazon stands today as the most
> advanced and the most ambitious model of a future under oligarchic control,
> including control of markets, work, information, consumerism, media and
> beyond. He doesn't merely see himself remaking commerce with his vast
> electronic networks, algorithms and metrics - but rebooting America itself,
> including changing our society's concept of a job, the definition of
> community, and even our basic values of fairness and justice. It amounts to
> a breathtaking aspiration to transform our culture's democratic paradigm
> into a corporate imperium, led by Amazon.
>
> Amazon's most recent announcement is that it wants to get inside your home
> -
> and, ironically, it's using "security" as its rationale. Rather than Amazon
> leaving products you order on your doorstep, the corporation wants a key to
> unlock your door so its delivery crews can do you the favor of placing the
> products you order inside your abode.
>
> Would you give your house key to a complete stranger, letting that person -
> whose name you don't even know - walk right into your home when you're not
> there? What could possibly go wrong with that? Other than your being
> robbed,
> of course, either by rogue Amazon employees or by hackers who will
> certainly
> gain access to the corporation's computerized key codes. Or maybe
> "Crusher,"
> your Pitbull, mauls the Amazon intruder and you get sued.
>
> Need I mention that Bezos expects you to pay for the privilege of having
> his
> employees enter your home? First, his dicey, open-sesame program, which he
> calls "Amazon Key," is available only to customers who shell out $99 a year
> to be "Amazon Prime" members.
>
> Second, you must buy a special internet-unlocking gizmo and a particular
> camera to join his corporate key club. And guess where you must go to buy
> this entry technology? Yes, Amazon - where prices for the system start at
> $250.
>
> What a deal! For Amazon, that is. Bezos' real goal (indeed, his only goal,
> always) is not to get inside your home, but inside your wallet.
>
> Not satisfied with just taking your money, Bezos is coming after your tax
> dollars as well.
>
> Many politicians across the country piously rant against giving a few bucks
> worth of jobless benefits to the needy, then turn around and shove billions
> of our tax dollars into corporate welfare for the greedy!
>
> And with Amazon, here we go again. We're presently witnessing the most
> disgusting spectacle yet of the politico-corporate cabal extracting money
> from the People's wallets to enrich themselves. The $136-billion-a-year
> internet colossus, has haughtily generated a shameful public bidding war
> over the location of its new corporate headquarters. The "winner"
> essentially will be the city and state that offers the most bribe money
> from
> their treasury.
>
> Uber-rich Amazon doesn't need and certainly doesn't deserve this giveaway,
> but officials in 238 cities have prostrated themselves in front of the
> welfare queen in an embarrassing bid to win her nod. In fact, their offers
> have been based on Amazon's very specific demands, including a
> "business-friendly environment and tax structure," plus free land, payment
> of its capital and operational costs, tax breaks, relocation grants for
> executives and workforce, reduced utility bills and construction fees
> and...
> oh yeah, also give us first-rate schools and an educated labor pool.
>
> As one analyst of Amazon's one-sided scams noted, "these incentives aren't
> free. There's no fairy godmother paying for them." The usual result of
> corporate giveaways is that the public cost exceeds any benefits we get
> back. Ironically, by demanding such corporate spoils, Amazon brands itself
> a
> common thief, stealing public trust in the fairness of the system and
> widening inequality in our society.
>
> C 2015 Creators Syndicate
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Jim Hightower
>
>
>
>
> Jim Hightower is a national radio commentator, writer, public speaker, and
> author of the book, Swim Against The Current: Even A Dead Fish Can Go With
> The Flow. Hightower has spent three decades battling the Powers That Be on
> behalf of the Powers That Ought To Be - consumers, working families,
> environmentalists, small businesses, and just-plain-folks.
>
>
>
>
>