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Toeing the line of the corporate world The rich grow richer while the poor suffer

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9 May 2014 08:03 pm - 0     - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

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“For the first time in history, average Americans have less education and are less prosperous than their parents.” – this quote is taken from the movie “Inside Job” (2010). Charles Ferguson’s documentary on the financial meltdown won an array of awards including the Best Documentary Academy Award.USA, the world’s superpower is marching backwards, would you agree? The world is supposed to get better each year. Instead, the reverse is happening and it appears to be led by the USA.

In 1931, in his influential book titled “The Epic of America”, James Truslow Adams wrote about the American dream. He said, “that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement.”  Holly Johnson wrote and sang in 1989, 25 years ago, that America is “a place where a kid without a cent can grow up to be President.”
Today, a kid without a cent might do that. However, he has to show first that he will comply with the intentions of the corporate world before he starts his journey. Even if you are from an influential background, if you become unfriendly to the commercial giants, just like Al Gore did, you will be eliminated from the race for Presidency.

The world, again led by the USA, has increasingly become cosier for a few super-rich people and colder for billions of common people. For example, the wealth distribution in the USA has been gradually manipulated over a few decades. Even over a decade ago, the Congressional Budget Office in the USA reported that inequality in wealth distribution in America was getting worse. They found that “average household incomes before taxes grew in real terms by nearly one-third between 1979 and 1997, but that growth was shared unevenly across the income distribution”.

The average income for households in the top fifth of the distribution rose by more than half. In contrast, the average income for the middle quintile climbed 10 per cent, and that for the lowest fifth dropped slightly.


Between 1998 and 2008 the financial industry [i.e. the most corrupt and most powerful in the corporate world] spent over $5 billion on lobbying and campaign contributions. And since the crisis [which is the financial meltdown in USA], they’re spending even more



”But the worst part is that for the top 1% the average income more than doubled, rising from $420,000 in 1979 to more than $1 million in 1997.To quote the movie “Inside Job” again: “Inequality of wealth in the United States is now higher than in any other developed country.”

  • Why does mainstream media keep this information from us?
  • How come the world is going back on its development?
  • Why are we not aware of it?
  • What about the politicians, the administrators, academics (economists,especially), judges, lawyers, doctors and other professionals?
  • Are they all deaf and blind?
     
“Inside Job” tells us the answer as well. “Between 1998 and 2008 the financial industry [i.e. the most corrupt and most powerful in the corporate world] spent over $5 billion on lobbying and campaign contributions. And since the crisis [which is the financial meltdown in USA], they’re spending even more.”

Who are they lobbying and who are they campaigning for? Do we hear right? In both strategy plans they could well be politicians, academics, lawyers, judges, policy makers, media and many more. Lobbying and campaigning are done in a subtle way making sure the one who is being lobbied and campaigned is allowed to disbelieve that this is happening. Instead, he or she believes that he or she is too smart and that is why people are too eager to give them so many gifts and expensive holidays.

The tobacco industry does not fall behind financial industry. Probably, they are the ones that taught the tricks to the finance industry, in the first place.
Libertad Inc. is a not a profit making organisation and it was set up fully funded by the Tobacco Industry in the USA.

Libertad hosts events and seminars in exotic locations worldwide for legislators, bureaucrats and judges. It is now clear that some judges who attended these seminars made rulings in favour of certain tobacco companies afterwards.  The Pharmaceutical Industry is another close contender in corrupting our leaders. Big Pharma, as they are known, want more profits - the bigger the better, and they want to see increase graphically. This collection of money is not to save more lives. They want a handful of rich people in their pockets which they will help to bulge. The richer the small group becomes the greater benefit to them. Where do the ordinary, common masses fit in? They must become even poorer!

In 2009, a plane from India carrying 500kg of a generic drug given for blood pressure had to make a stopover at Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport. The customs officials of Holland confiscated the entire stock. The drugs they confiscated were to be given to HIV-positive patients in poverty-stricken areas of Brazil. Those patients are still waiting for that stock to arrive.

It is not only the poor people in Brazil that suffer. The average American suffers, too. In 1950, the United States was the fifth among the leading industrialised nations with respect to female life expectancy at birth. Now they are the 46th in female life expectancy; 49th for both sexes.



The wealth distribution in the USA has been gradually manipulated over a few decades. Even over a decade ago, the Congressional Budget Office in the USA reported that inequality in wealth distribution in America was getting worse



It is time to get back to basics again. Life expectancy, infant mortality rate, access to clean drinking water and other such standard indicators will help us to see if a country is doing well or not. And, Nestlé Chairman Peter Brabeck-Letmathe believes that water needs to be privatised. And, the Chairman of a transnational giant food producer recently expressed that water needs to be privatised. How can we turn this tide?

We must get back to basics. How many Indians are on the Forbes Richest 500? The list is meaningless in deriving some idea about how Indians are doing on an average.

Knowing that 25 million Indian children go to bed each night hungry and wake up starving is more informative, although stinging.

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