Community Organizers vs Entreprenuers

[merh]

'CEOs, Not Working People, Are Causing Inflation': Report Shows Soaring Executive Pay
"When you look at those numbers and at CEOs trying to blame workers for inflation, it just doesn't add up," said the secretary-treasurer of the AFL-CIO.

JAKE JOHNSON.  July 19, 2022
The AFL-CIO's latest annual analysis of top executive pay was published Monday with the following conclusion: "CEOs, not working people, are causing inflation."

In recent months, corporate bosses and top Federal Reserve officials have pointed to workers' wages as a factor in surging prices, which have pushed overall inflation in the United States to a four-decade high.

"Runaway CEO pay is a symptom of greedflation—when companies increase prices to boost corporate profits and create windfall payouts for corporate CEOs."

But the AFL-CIO's new report attempts to reframe the national inflation discussion, emphasizing that while wage increases won by ordinary workers are drawing outsized attention from policymakers and executives, CEO pay hikes significantly outpaced the wage increases of rank-and-file employees last year.

Titled "Greedflation," the report shows that "in 2021, CEOs of S&P 500 companies received, on average, $18.3 million in total compensation."

"CEO pay rose 18.2%, faster than the U.S. inflation rate of 7.1%," the analysis finds. "In contrast, U.S. workers' wages fell behind inflation, with worker wages rising only 4.7% in 2021. The average S&P 500 company's CEO-to-worker pay ratio was 324-to-1."

The highest-paid executive among S&P 500 companies last year was Expedia's Peter Kern, who brought in an eye-popping $296 million in total compensation.

Other executives at the top of the 2021 list were Amazon CEO Andy Jassy ($213 million), Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger ($179 million), Apple CEO Tim Cook ($99 million), and JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon ($84 million).

"Runaway CEO pay is a symptom of greedflation—when companies increase prices to boost corporate profits and create windfall payouts for corporate CEOs," the new analysis states.

During a conference call outlining the report's findings, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Fred Redmond said that "when you look at those numbers and at CEOs trying to blame workers for inflation, it just doesn't add up."

In his remarks during an earnings call earlier this year, for instance, Amazon's chief financial officer attributed inflationary pressures felt within the company during the final quarter of 2021 to "wage increases and incentives in our operations."

But Redmond pointed out that "last year, Amazon delivered the highest CEO-to-worker pay ratio in the S&P 500 Index with a pay ratio of 6,474 to 1."

"Amazon's new CEO Andy Jassy received $212.7 million in total compensation," he noted. "What did Amazon's median worker earn last year? Just $32,855... Corporate profits and runaway CEO pay are responsible for causing inflation, not workers' wages."

In a blog post on Monday, economist Dean Baker similarly argued that soaring executive pay is contributing to inflation, which has eroded modest wage gains that many ordinary workers have seen since late 2020.

"We... transfer tens of billions of dollars upward to CEOs and other top corporate executives through the corrupt corporate governance structure that we have instituted," writes Baker, a senior economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research. "In this context, it is not surprising that even mediocre CEOs can get paychecks in the tens of millions of dollars annually. And, it is not just the CEO. If the CEO gets $20 million, the chief financial officer might get $10 to $12 million, and even third-tier executives may get $2 to $3 million."

"This is all inflationary," he added.

The AFL-CIO's analysis was released as the Federal Reserve gears up to hike interest rates by another 75 basis points at its upcoming policy meeting, a move that economists fear could push the U.S. economy closer to recession.

The second consecutive 0.75 percentage point rate hike is expected despite evidence that key divers of inflation—such as gas prices—are cooling. Wage growth has also slowed substantially in recent months, prompting experts to warn that additional rate increases could slash wages by driving up the unemployment rate—a potential disaster for millions.

"Higher unemployment lowers wage growth much more reliably and by larger amounts than it lowers inflation," notes Josh Bivens, director of research at the Economic Policy Institute, noted last week. "Currently, wage growth is decelerating. This means there is no genuine need for a recession to pull wage growth down to sustainable levels."

The AFL-CIO's Redmond echoed that sentiment Monday, declaring that "we need to raise wages to help working people cope with rising prices, not make working people poorer by causing a recession."

[abbey1227]

Jul 20, 2022 5:39:13 GMT merh said:

'CEOs, Not Working People, Are Causing Inflation': Report Shows Soaring Executive Pay
"When you look at those numbers and at CEOs trying to blame workers for inflation, it just doesn't add up," said the secretary-treasurer of the AFL-CIO.

I've heard several unions are suddenly flush with cash from the Govt..........nice payback for that election, huh?

here's this, too............ September 15, 2020

Executive Compensation at the AFL-CIO
by Anne Paddock

The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) is a federation of 55 labor unions that represent nearly 13 million workers. A non-profit, tax-exempt 501 (c) (5) – a labor organization, the AFL-CIO is headquartered in Washington, DC.

Key facts about the AFL-CIO include the following information taken from the IRS Form 990’s:

The AFL-CIO has 14 related tax-exempt, non-profit organizations, 9 of whom operate out of the same office address. The other 5 organizations also operate out of a DC-based office but at a different street address.

Revenue has been declining over the past 5 years. In 2013, total revenue was $158 million. By 2017, revenue was down to $140 million and by 2018, total revenue was $119 million which appears to indicate membership has been declining but could also be due to a decline in royalties, or a combination of both.

Revenue primarily comes from two sources: memberships dues and royalties. In 2018, $72 million of the $119 million (61%) came from memberships dues while $38 million (32% of total revenue) came from royalties.

Expenses totaled $100 million in 2018 – $19 million less than the revenue raised. The $19 million was added to the general fund which increased from $14 million at the beginning of the year to $34 million at year-end – a significant increase.

The AFL-CIO has 5 primary expenses: compensation, grants, office-related expenses, royalties, and travel and conferences.

In 2018, compensation used up nearly half the revenue. 448 employees received $48 million in compensation, which equates to an average compensation of $107,000. However, only 145 employees received more than $100,000 in compensation. The 15 most highly compensated employees were reported to be:

$544,786: Sean McGarvey, VP (compensation from an affiliated organization)
$389,957: Richard Trumka, President
$331,682: Tefere Gebre, EVP
$330,732: Larry Willis, General Board Member (from an affiliated org)
$323,216: Elizabeth Shuler, Secretary-Treasurer
$260,255: Terry Stapleton, Assistant to the President
$257,777: Jonathan Hiatt, Chief of Staff, Executive Asst to President
$257,080: Craig Becker, General Counsel
$256,280: Paul Almeida, General Board Member (from an affiliated org)
$254,749: Paul Lemmon, Chief of Staff, Executive Asst to President
$250,364: Damon Silvers, Special Counsel to President
$242,063: Michael Cavanaugh, Executive Assistant to Vice President
$241,634: Lynn Rhinehart, General Counsel
$195,438: Richard Kline, General Board Member (from an affiliated org)
$192,093: James Hart, General Board Member (from an affiliated org)

13 of the 15 most highly compensated employees listed above are male while 2 of the 15 are female. Given that the AFL-CIO promotes how much they care about gender equality on the front page of their website, how is it that 87% of the most highly compensated employees are male while 13% are female?

In addition, it is important to point out Labor Pains (www.laborpains.org) reported on December 1, 2017 (half way through the 2017-2018 year) that Terry Stapleton (listed above) recently resigned (November 6, 2017) after being accused of sending lewd text messages to his secretary and suggested he could protect her job if she had a sexual relationship with him.

paddockpost.com/2020/09/15/executive-compensation-at-the-afl-cio/

[merh]

Jul 20, 2022 7:17:29 GMT abbey1227 said:

Jul 20, 2022 5:39:13 GMT merh said:

I've heard several unions are suddenly flush with cash from the Govt..........nice payback for that election, huh?

here's this, too............ September 15, 2020

Executive Compensation at the AFL-CIO
by Anne Paddock

The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) is a federation of 55 labor unions that represent nearly 13 million workers. A non-profit, tax-exempt 501 (c) (5) – a labor organization, the AFL-CIO is headquartered in Washington, DC.

Key facts about the AFL-CIO include the following information taken from the IRS Form 990’s:

The AFL-CIO has 14 related tax-exempt, non-profit organizations, 9 of whom operate out of the same office address. The other 5 organizations also operate out of a DC-based office but at a different street address.

Revenue has been declining over the past 5 years. In 2013, total revenue was $158 million. By 2017, revenue was down to $140 million and by 2018, total revenue was $119 million which appears to indicate membership has been declining but could also be due to a decline in royalties, or a combination of both.

Revenue primarily comes from two sources: memberships dues and royalties. In 2018, $72 million of the $119 million (61%) came from memberships dues while $38 million (32% of total revenue) came from royalties.

Expenses totaled $100 million in 2018 – $19 million less than the revenue raised. The $19 million was added to the general fund which increased from $14 million at the beginning of the year to $34 million at year-end – a significant increase.

The AFL-CIO has 5 primary expenses: compensation, grants, office-related expenses, royalties, and travel and conferences.

In 2018, compensation used up nearly half the revenue. 448 employees received $48 million in compensation, which equates to an average compensation of $107,000. However, only 145 employees received more than $100,000 in compensation. The 15 most highly compensated employees were reported to be:

$544,786: Sean McGarvey, VP (compensation from an affiliated organization)
$389,957: Richard Trumka, President
$331,682: Tefere Gebre, EVP
$330,732: Larry Willis, General Board Member (from an affiliated org)
$323,216: Elizabeth Shuler, Secretary-Treasurer
$260,255: Terry Stapleton, Assistant to the President
$257,777: Jonathan Hiatt, Chief of Staff, Executive Asst to President
$257,080: Craig Becker, General Counsel
$256,280: Paul Almeida, General Board Member (from an affiliated org)
$254,749: Paul Lemmon, Chief of Staff, Executive Asst to President
$250,364: Damon Silvers, Special Counsel to President
$242,063: Michael Cavanaugh, Executive Assistant to Vice President
$241,634: Lynn Rhinehart, General Counsel
$195,438: Richard Kline, General Board Member (from an affiliated org)
$192,093: James Hart, General Board Member (from an affiliated org)

13 of the 15 most highly compensated employees listed above are male while 2 of the 15 are female. Given that the AFL-CIO promotes how much they care about gender equality on the front page of their website, how is it that 87% of the most highly compensated employees are male while 13% are female?

In addition, it is important to point out Labor Pains (www.laborpains.org) reported on December 1, 2017 (half way through the 2017-2018 year) that Terry Stapleton (listed above) recently resigned (November 6, 2017) after being accused of sending lewd text messages to his secretary and suggested he could protect her job if she had a sexual relationship with him.

paddockpost.com/2020/09/15/executive-compensation-at-the-afl-cio/

The highest-paid executive among S&P 500 companies last year was Expedia's Peter Kern, who brought in an eye-popping $296 million in total compensation.

Other executives at the top of the 2021 list were Amazon CEO Andy Jassy ($213 million), Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger ($179 million), Apple CEO Tim Cook ($99 million), and JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon ($84 million).

Not even close, is it?

$544,786: Sean McGarvey, VP (compensation from an affiliated organization)

What does that mean?
He's paid by someone else, but they are counting it?
They could pay 150 people what he gets paid & still have money left over out of Jamie Dimon's salary.

[abbey1227]

Jul 20, 2022 14:38:02 GMT merh said:

The highest-paid executive among S&P 500 companies last year was Expedia's Peter Kern, who brought in an eye-popping $296 million in total compensation.

Other executives at the top of the 2021 list were Amazon CEO Andy Jassy ($213 million), Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger ($179 million), Apple CEO Tim Cook ($99 million), and JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon ($84 million).

Not even close, is it?

$544,786: Sean McGarvey, VP (compensation from an affiliated organization)

What does that mean?
He's paid by someone else, but they are counting it?
They could pay 150 people what he gets paid & still have money left over out of Jamie Dimon's salary.

such the Female Leftist response...........WHAT does the Union produce that makes a profit? NOTHING! So WTF would it be anywhere near what a privately run position would be?

And that's how your brain works on Planned Parenthood, too. Because they split themselves into other groups, don another name and launder money between their various offices, you call it getting paid by someone else? So it's all good? No wonder you're good with the Clinton Foundation hiring Chelsea for $600,000/yr right outta college.

MAKE a profit with something people actually wanna voluntarily pay for.........and there should really be no reason for criticism.

[merh]

Revealed: oil sector’s ‘staggering’ $3bn-a-day profits for last 50 years
Vast sums provide power to ‘buy every politician’ and delay action on climate crisis, says expert

An offshore oil rig in the Pechora Sea, Russia
Damian Carrington Environment editor
@dpcarrington
Thu 21 Jul 2022 06.30 EDT
The oil and gas industry has delivered $2.8bn (£2.3bn) a day in pure profit for the last 50 years, a new analysis has revealed.

The vast total captured by petrostates and fossil fuel companies since 1970 is $52tn, providing the power to “buy every politician, every system” and delay action on the climate crisis, says Prof Aviel Verbruggen, the author of the analysis. The huge profits were inflated by cartels of countries artificially restricting supply.

The analysis, based on World Bank data, assesses the “rent” secured by global oil and gas sales, which is the economic term for the unearned profit produced after the total cost of production has been deducted.

The study has yet to be published in an academic journal but three experts at University College London, the London School of Economics and the thinktank Carbon Tracker confirmed the analysis as accurate, with one calling the total a “staggering number”. It appears to be the first long-term assessment of the sector’s total profits, with oil rents providing 86% of the total.


Emissions from the burning of fossil fuels have driven the climate crisis and contributed to worsening extreme weather, including the current heatwaves hitting the UK and many other Northern hemisphere countries. Oil companies have known for decades that carbon emissions were dangerously heating the planet.

“I was really surprised by such high numbers – they are enormous,” said Verbruggen, an energy and environmental economist at the University of Antwerp, Belgium, and a former lead author of an Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report.

“It’s a huge amount of money,” he said. “You can buy every politician, every system with all this money, and I think this happened. It protects [producers] from political interference that may limit their activities.”

The rents captured by exploiting the natural resources are unearned, Verbruggen said: “It’s real, pure profit. They captured 1% of all the wealth in the world without doing anything for it.” The average annual profit from 1970-2020 was $1tn but he said he expected this to be twice as high in 2022.


The profit-grabbing is holding back the world’s action on the climate emergency, he said: “It’s really stripping money from the alternatives. In every country, people have so much difficulty just to pay the gas and electricity bills and oil [petrol] bill, that we don’t have money left over to invest in renewables.”

Some of the rents go to governments as royalties, says Prof Paul Ekins, at University College London: “But the fact remains that, over the last 50 years, companies have made a huge amount of money by producing fossil fuels, the burning of which is the major cause of climate change. This is already causing untold misery round the world and is a major threat to future human civilisation.

“At the very least these companies should be investing a far greater share of their profits in moving to low-carbon energy than is currently the case. Until they do so their claims of being part of the low-carbon energy transition are among the most egregious examples of greenwashing.”

Mark Campanale, at Carbon Tracker, said: “Not only is the scale of these rents eye-watering, but it is salient to note that, in the midst of a cost of living crisis caused by record oil and gas prices, this flow of money to a relatively small number of petrostates and energy companies is set to double this year. Shifting to a carbon-neutral energy system based on renewables is the only way to end this madness.”

The Guardian revealed in May that the world’s biggest fossil fuel firms are planning scores of “carbon bomb” oil and gas projects that would drive the climate past internationally agreed temperature limits with catastrophic global impacts. The fossil fuel industry also benefits from subsidies of $16bn a day, according to the International Monetary Fund.

Verbruggen’s analysis used the World Bank’s oil rent and gas rent data, which the bank compiles country-by-country and is expressed as percentage of global GDP. He then multiplied this by the World Bank’s global GDP data and adjusted for inflation to put all the figures in 2020 US dollars.

Verbruggen said oil-rich nations, such as Russia and those in the OPEC cartel, including Saudi Arabia, kept rents high by restricting supply: “They change the fundamentals of the markets.” Military action, such as the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, and political action, such as the embargo on oil exports from Iran, had also increased the rents, he said. If all available oil and gas could be freely supplied to the market, the price of conventional oil would be $20-30 a barrel, Verbruggen said, compared with about $100 today.

There is far more oil, gas and coal in existing reserves than can be burned if the world is to limit global heating to 1.5C, the target agreed by nations in the Paris climate agreement in 2015. Campanale said: “To keep to 1.5C, this means [international oil companies alone] forgoing around $100 trillion of potential revenues. You can see why oil oligarchs and nations controlled by political elites want to keep their fossil fuel rents, the source of their power.”

May Boeve, the head of campaign group 350.org, said: “These profits have enabled the fossil fuel industry to combat all efforts to switch our energy systems. We have to dismantle such rent-seeking systems and build our future based on accessible and distributed renewable energy that is more sustainable and democratic in every way.”

www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jul/21/revealed-oil-sectors-staggering-profits-last-50-years

[merh]

[abbey1227]

Jul 26, 2022 22:43:41 GMT merh said:

oh man......... I only WISH I'd made 35K in a year.   

[merh]

Jul 27, 2022 5:01:55 GMT abbey1227 said:

Jul 26, 2022 22:43:41 GMT merh said:

oh man......... I only WISH I'd made 35K in a year.   

I was going to ask if you did...
Decided that would be rude.

Manners & all.

[abbey1227]

Jul 27, 2022 9:45:51 GMT merh said:

I was going to ask if you did...
Decided that would be rude.

Manners & all.

My Mother in Law wondered if I was dealing drugs when me and the Mrs first hooked up.     I just stretch a dollar like most do not

[merh]

ELON MUSK IS CONVINCED HE'S THE FUTURE. WE NEED TO LOOK BEYOND HIM
Elon Musk Is Convinced He's the Future. We Need to Look Beyond Him
IDEAS
BY PARIS MARX
AUGUST 8, 2022 7:00 AM EDT

Elon Musk is a singular visionary driving humanity toward a better future—or at least that’s what he and his admirers want us to believe. For the past two decades, supporters and news outlets have praised him for the bold narratives he’s woven around Tesla and SpaceX, and by extension allowed him to evade scrutiny and become the world’s richest man. Any time Musk sends a tweet, you can check his replies to see the devotion of his millions of followers.

As his profile has been elevated by relentless media attention, Musk has become the figure everyone was looking for: a powerful man who sold the fantasy that faith in the combined power of technology and the market could change the world without needing a role for the government. (Just don’t talk about the billions in subsidies that kept his companies going over the years.)

But that collective admiration has only served to bolster an unaccountable and increasingly hostile billionaire. The holes in those future visions, and the dangers of applauding billionaire visionaries, have only become harder to ignore.

Tesla’s trouble
As CEO of Tesla, Musk’s plan was to use luxury vehicles to fund a more affordable electric car. The Model 3 was supposed to be that vehicle, starting at $35,000. But the current starting price is $46,990, and most buyers end up paying even more. Teslas are supposed to be the model for “green” automobility, but the emissions required for the production of each individual vehicle are on the rise, and there are persistent problems with production quality which means they’re at risk of not lasting as long as vehicles from other carmakers.

More importantly, those vehicles don’t have a clean, green supply chain. Around the world, mining companies are salivating at the opportunity presented by a shift to battery-powered vehicles because they’re so much more mineral-intensive than the ones we drive today. The International Energy Agency expects demand for battery minerals to soar by 2040, including up to 2,100 percent for cobalt and 4,200 percent for lithium.

But that extraction comes with serious consequences for local environments and nearby communities. In 2019, Tesla was named in a lawsuit over the deaths of children in the Democratic Republic of Congo who died mining cobalt at sites owned by British mining company Glencore. Despite talking about cobalt-free batteries, Musk proceeded to sign a deal with Glencore in 2020 to supply its Berlin and Shanghai factories. The lawsuit was dismissed in November 2021, but in April of this year, an investigation from Global Witness found that Tesla was among a number of companies that may be getting minerals from mines using child workers in the DRC.

It may be easy to overlook consequences that exist at the other end of Tesla’s supply chain, but these problems extend deep into the heart of its manufacturing operation. Black workers dubbed the company’s Fremont factory “the plantation” after being subject to racist abuse and a number of women described sexual harassment at the facility as “nightmarish.” Meanwhile, workers at the Nevada Gigafactory are suing after a mass firing of over 500 people, following reports that Musk praised workers in Tesla’s Shanghai factory for “burning the 3 am oil” by working 12-hour shifts and six-day weeks while sleeping on the factory floor.

To top it off, Tesla’s customers are also being put in harm’s way. Its vehicles have slammed into highway medians, emergency vehicles, transport trucks, and more, while using its supposedly self-driving Autopilot feature. Musk continually misleads the public about how safe and capable the system really is, even as the U.S. traffic safety regulator is poised to recall hundreds of thousands of vehicles. And Tesla is just the tip of the iceberg.

A self-serving future
Elon Musk has wielded a virtual monopoly on how we think about the future, but will his visions really deliver better lives for most people in our society? For all the tech industry’s talk of “disruption,” keeping us all trapped in cars for decades into the future by equipping them with batteries or upgraded computers doesn’t feel like much of a revolution.

A much more sustainable alternative to mass ownership of electric vehicles is to get people out of cars altogether—that entails making serious investments to create more reliable public transit networks, building out cycling infrastructure so people can safely ride a bike, and revitalizing the rail network after decades of underinvestment. But Musk has continually tried to stand in the way of such alternatives.

He has a history of floating false solutions to the drawbacks of our over-reliance on cars that stifle efforts to give people other options. The Boring Company was supposed to solve traffic, not be the Las Vegas amusement ride it is now. As I’ve written in my book, Musk admitted to his biographer Ashlee Vance that Hyperloop was all about trying to get legislators to cancel plans for high-speed rail in California—even though he had no plans to build it.

Several years ago, Musk said that public transit was “a pain in the ass” where you were surrounded by strangers, including possible serial killers, to justify his opposition. But the futures sold to us by Musk and many others in Silicon Valley didn’t just suit their personal preferences. They were designed to meet business needs, and were the cause of just as many problems as they claimed to solve—if not more.

As Musk sets our collective sights on Mars, a town in south Texas and nearby wildlife reserve are being sacrificed on the altar of his personal ambition. SpaceX recently fired employees who wrote an open letter asking it to distance itself from its increasingly controversial CEO, while astronomers and Indigenous groups have expressed concern about what Starlink is doing to the night sky. Meanwhile, scientists will tell you living on Mars won’t be an easy task. In service of his dreams, Musk is purposefully obscuring those challenges.

Finding new inspiration
In crafting his future visions, Musk draws on the libertarian tendencies of Robert Heinlein and a technocratic longtermism inspired by Isaac Asimov’s Foundation series, not to mention the dreams of Nazi-turned-NASA rocket engineer Wernher von Braun. Future visions cribbed from the pages of science fiction—often of the dystopian variety—and reshaped to fit the desires of the richest man in the world don’t serve the broader public. But there are other authors who provide very different answers to the questions of technology and the future.

In 1985, Ursula K. Le Guin took aim at this “imperialistic kind” of science fiction that inspires Musk, in which “space and the future are synonymous: they are a place we are going to get to, invade, colonize, exploit, and suburbanize.” The renowned novelist explained that science fiction is not actually about the future; it’s about us and our thoughts and our dreams. But when we get confused about that, “we succumb to wishful thinking and escapism, and our science fiction gets megalomania and thinks that instead of being fiction it’s prediction.”

That’s exactly where we find ourselves now: having our future dictated by powerful people who seek to recreate the space colonies or dystopian virtual reality worlds they read about as kids without considering the consequences. Kim Stanley Robinson, whose Mars trilogy helped inspire some of the recent interest in colonizing the red planet, has called Musk’s plan “the 1920s science-fiction cliché of the boy who builds a rocket to the moon in his backyard” and one that’s dangerously distracting us from the real problems we face here on Earth.

For Le Guin, part of the problem is how we tell the human story: as one where a singular hero aggressively pushes it toward resolution, whether it’s the hunter with their bow or the Great Man driving society forward. It also infects our conception of technology, positioning it as “a heroic undertaking, Herculean, Promethean, conceived as triumph”—or as a call to “build”—rather than “the active human interface with the material world” and the more mundane technologies we rely on every day.

Make no mistake: there is a need for people to think about the future and what a better one looks like, especially as we face serious challenges like the climate crisis. But we also need to question the idea of “progress” being sold to us and who it ultimately benefits. The tech industry enjoys casting itself as our savior, delivering empowerment and convenience, but along with it has come an unprecedented expansion of surveillance, an erosion of workers’ rights, and the empowerment of white nationalist and fascist groups

For years, Elon Musk sold us fantasies to distract from the reality of the future he’s trying to build, and to get people to accept his growing belligerence. What we really need right now is not more cars, colonization dreams, and technokings, but a collective project to improve the lives of billions of people around the world while taking on the immediate challenges we face regardless of whether it generates corporate profits. That’s something Elon Musk can never deliver.

[abbey1227]

Aug 11, 2022 20:38:57 GMT merh said:

ELON MUSK IS CONVINCED HE'S THE FUTURE. WE NEED TO LOOK BEYOND HIM


He has a history of floating false solutions to the drawbacks of our over-reliance on cars that stifle efforts to give people other options. The Boring Company was supposed to solve traffic, not be the Las Vegas amusement ride it is now. As I’ve written in my book, Musk admitted to his biographer Ashlee Vance that Hyperloop was all about trying to get legislators to cancel plans for high-speed rail in California—even though he had no plans to build it.

Several years ago, Musk said that public transit was “a pain in the ass” where you were surrounded by strangers, including possible serial killers, to justify his opposition. But the futures sold to us by Musk and many others in Silicon Valley didn’t just suit their personal preferences. They were designed to meet business needs, and were the cause of just as many problems as they claimed to solve—if not more.Sorry? Did he stop high speed rail from getting built on time and under budget? Or did your politicians screw that pooch all by themselves? How is he stifling anyone else from creating a better mouse trap?

[merh]

[abbey1227]

Aug 27, 2022 8:06:16 GMT merh said:

Where do we all sign up for these PPP loans?

[merh]

Aug 27, 2022 12:32:05 GMT abbey1227 said:

Aug 27, 2022 8:06:16 GMT merh said:

Where do we all sign up for these PPP loans?

Dude, you don't remember?
The shutdown?

Businesses were given loans to continue paying employees, but the loans went out to rich white people way more than minority businesses?

Tom Brady, etc, got them.

But now everyone is screaming about student loans getting $10,000 forgiven.

EXCLUSIVE: It pays to be rich! America's wealthiest, including Tom Brady, Khloe Kardashian, Reese Witherspoon, Kanye and Nancy Pelosi's husband took millions in PPP loans - and nearly all have been forgiven
By Chris White For Dailymail.com
09:29 EDT 17 Aug 2022 , updated 11:40 EDT 17 Aug 2022

Celebrities including Kanye West, Jay-Z and Khloe Kardashian received millions in government PPP (Payment Protection Program) loans, set up for desperate businesses hit by the Covid pandemic
DailyMail.com can now reveal the exact amounts that these millionaires took out via the government program
Kanye West's Yeezy LLC borrowed $2,363,585, with $1,772,689 being spent on payroll for 106 staff
Khloe Kardashian's denim brand Good American LLC had a loan of $1,245,405 approved on April 14, 2020, mostly for the payroll of 57 workers. The full amount, plus interest, was forgiven
In most cases, the loans have been 'forgiven' so the full amount, including interest, will not have to be repaid, despite the owners' wealth
The companies of mega-rich celebrities, including billionaires Kanye West and Jay-Z, received millions in government PPP loans – and in virtually every case the A-listers have been let off the hook for paying back the full amount.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11113221/Wealthy-Khloe-Kardashian-Reese-Witherspoon-got-millions-PPP-loans-didnt-pay-back.html

Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene had $183,504 in PPP loans forgiven’: White House calls out Republicans criticizing student-loan forgiveness
Aarthi Swaminathan

[abbey1227]

Aug 27, 2022 13:47:14 GMT merh said:

Dude, you don't remember?
The shutdown?

Businesses were given loans to continue paying employees, but the loans went out to rich white people way more than minority businesses?

Tom Brady, etc, got them.

But now everyone is screaming about student loans getting $10,000 forgiven.

Maybe I'm looking at this wrong.......... you wanted Employers to keep paying their employees? despite being forced to shut down by the Govt? HOW?

I wouldn't call those loans, per se.......... I'd call it using those businesses as the middle man in handing out tax dollars to keep people from revolting against the lock downs.

And what's with the 3rd Grade understanding of Employment? Tom Brady and others were just supposed to keep paying people despite being shut down? WHY? Cuz they have money? How infantile can we get as a nation?

[merh]

Aug 27, 2022 15:31:53 GMT abbey1227 said:

Aug 27, 2022 13:47:14 GMT merh said:

Dude, you don't remember?
The shutdown?

Businesses were given loans to continue paying employees, but the loans went out to rich white people way more than minority businesses?

Tom Brady, etc, got them.

But now everyone is screaming about student loans getting $10,000 forgiven.

Maybe I'm looking at this wrong.......... you wanted Employers to keep paying their employees? despite being forced to shut down by the Govt? HOW?

I wouldn't call those loans, per se.......... I'd call it using those businesses as the middle man in handing out tax dollars to keep people from revolting against the lock downs.

And what's with the 3rd Grade understanding of Employment? Tom Brady and others were just supposed to keep paying people despite being shut down? WHY? Cuz they have money? How infantile can we get as a nation?

Problem is their millionaire asses could better afford it than my local mom&pop shop that probably didn't get it.

Marjorie Taylor Greene needed $183,000? 
Yet she's bitching about the student loan stuff?

[merh]

Sen. Ted Cruz said Biden's student-loan forgiveness plan will "drive up turnout" for Democrats in November. "Maybe you weren't gonna vote in November, and suddenly you just got 20 grand," Cruz said of the plan.

TEXT:

Sen. Ted Cruz on Friday railed against President Joe Biden's student-loan forgiveness plan, predicting it'll give Democrats an edge in the upcoming midterm elections.



"If you are that slacker barista who wasted seven years in college studying completely useless things, now has loans and can't get a job, Joe Biden just gave you 20 grand," Cruz said during an appearance on his "Verdict with Ted Cruz" podcast. "Like, holy cow! 20 grand. You know, maybe you weren't gonna vote in November, and suddenly you just got 20 grand."



"And you know, if you can get off the bong for a minute and head down to the voting station," he continued. "Or just send in your mail-in ballot that the Democrats have helpfully sent you, it could drive up turnout, particularly among young people."



Cruz said "there is a real risk" that the Democrats will net more support in November.

The Biden administration earlier this week announced a plan to cancel $10,000 in student-loan debt for borrowers whose annual income does not exceed $125,000.



"For too many people, student loan debt has hindered their ability to achieve their dreams—including buying a home, starting a business, or providing for their family," Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said in a statement. "Getting an education should set us free; not strap us down! That's why, since Day One, the Biden-Harris administration has worked to fix broken federal student aid programs and deliver unprecedented relief to borrowers."



Prominent Democrats like Sen. Bernie Sanders have slammed Cruz's remarks.



"This is what a leading Republican thinks of young 'slacker' Americans who took out loans to go to college," Sanders tweeted in response to a clip of his remarks.

A former official working in the Obama administration also criticized Cruz.

"Since Ted Cruz knows baristas have been spitting in his coffee for years, it's technically not punching down," said Brandon Friedman, former deputy assistant secretary for public affairs at the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development.

www.businessinsider.com/ted-cruz-biden-student-loan-forgiveness-plan-democrats-midterms-2022-8

[abbey1227]

Aug 27, 2022 20:03:26 GMT merh said:

Problem is their millionaire asses could better afford it than my local mom&pop shop that probably didn't get it.

Marjorie Taylor Greene needed $183,000? 
Yet she's bitching about the student loan stuff?

So the Govt got to pick Winners & Losers yet again. And we're all suffering for it. Fewer Mom & Pop places than ever before. More people looking for handouts than ever before.

Can't you see where this all leads?

What sort of business operations did she have? Maybe they should report WHERE that money went? Too much to investigate?

[merh]

Aug 28, 2022 2:02:19 GMT abbey1227 said:

Aug 27, 2022 20:03:26 GMT merh said:

Problem is their millionaire asses could better afford it than my local mom&pop shop that probably didn't get it.

Marjorie Taylor Greene needed $183,000? 
Yet she's bitching about the student loan stuff?

So the Govt got to pick Winners & Losers yet again. And we're all suffering for it. Fewer Mom & Pop places than ever before. More people looking for handouts than ever before.

Can't you see where this all leads?

What sort of business operations did she have? Maybe they should report WHERE that money went? Too much to investigate?

You really should have been there for They Live.
Haven't seen it in years. But it feels so much like now.

[merh]

The owner of the gym I work at turned off the water heater so the showers are ice cold, so people won’t shower and he can save money