If capitalism ever dies in the United States — as many believe it will — it won’t be caused by labor unions, liberals, environmentalists, civil rights activists or just plain do-gooders.
Rather, the death of capitalism will be the fault of the corporations themselves — especially the multinationals –which are reaping record profits, while paying their workers less every year. They get away with this because unions — which set wage standards for all workers, union and nonunion — are being slowly hammered into submission by the constant, aggressive attack from right-wing zealots seeking annihilation of the labor movement.
Unions now represent less than 12 percent of the nation’s workers, split about 50-50 between the public and private sectors. In the 1950s, 35 percent of all U.S. workers were represented by unions. In those days, wages were increasing and the union haters whined about the so-called “wage-price spiral.”
The U.S. Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision has made it legal for any outside group to contribute money to support cadidates through a Super Pac–which must disclose the identify of its donors–and/or so-called “social welfare groups” whose donors can remain anonymous.
This has unleashed a tidal wave of corporate and private dollars that are now flooding the electoral system. Republicans, because they are mostly supported by corporations and wealthy individuals, probably get more than 95 percent of that money.
That’s a problem for workers, because that money can also be used to corrupt Democrats, most of whom have in the past relied largely on union financial support to run their campaigns.
Unions and their members simply can’t match the huge amounts of money now accessible from giant multinational corporations and rich people — such as the Koch brothers, who are hell bent on destroying the middle class.
Before Citizens United, the business community outspent unions by 12 to 1 in state and federal elections. The gap is expected to increase by 25 to 1 in 2012, and will eventually grow exponentially, possibly to 100 to 1.
What happens to Democratic candidates who are being outspent by that magnitude?
They lose.
Or they go to the other side and become Republicrats, which some of them — the so-called bluedogs — are already.
While Democrats, for the most part, have been passively supportive of labor’s issues, they have refused over the years to provide enough votes to pass legislation that would have been the most meaningful to working families.
Even when they controlled both houses of Congress, or the White House and both houses of Congress, they were unable to achieve passage of any major labor law revisions, which are necessary just to maintain current living standards of both union and nonunion workers The congressional defeats have always come when key Democrats voted against the best interests of working families.
In 1965, Democrats provided the decisive votes in the congressional defeat of Section 14B of the Taft-Hartley Law that allows states to pass anti-worker “right-to-work” laws. In 1976, Democrats helped defeat a situs picketing bill, which would have lowered barriers to union organizing.
During the Clinton administration, Senate Democrats were instrumental in defeating a bill that would have prohibited employers from employing strikebreakers. And in 2009, the Employee Free Choice Act, which would have helped all workers, died in the Senate when key Democrats voted against the bill.
Labor never gets subsidies, tax loopholes, breaks and credits or earmarks, which Republicans, often aided and abetted by some Democrats, take for granted.
How attentive will Democrats be to the issues of working men and women if they are forced to accept more and more campaign funds from corporations just to stay even?
Supporters of Citizens United will then have achieved their goal. They will have co-opted and corrupted the Democratic Party and destroyed the middle class in the process.
It’s hard to imagine the capitalistic system surviving without a middle class—those millions of people buying goods and service on earnings of $35,000 to $75,000 a year.
Thank you bro Hansen well said I will be sharing with all I know
Jim you are so right in this article. In my humble middle class opinion Citizens United is a load of crap for all Americans. It is my belief that we have to come together as a nation of intelligent individuals and demand this be put to a stop.
It seems to me it would make common sense for the citizens of the United States to demand that each office that is sought be budgeted through government and the time frame for campaigning be adjusted wherein our elected officials are actually working for the American populace and not for themselves to be re-elected.
For instances:
Three month election cycle for all offices. NO CITIZENS UNITED, NO POLITICS, NO EXPENSIVE ADVERTISEMENTS, NO FUNDRAISING, NO TALKING WITH A CORPORATION, NO LOBBYING, NO BACK DOOR DEALS. LET’S TAKE OUT THE BALONEY OF TRYING TO CONFUSE THE ISSUES FOR YEAR(S) BEFORE THE ELECTION ACTUALLY TAKES PLACE. Which would then give our elected officials time to do their job and let their records speak openly for them. Novel idea.
No more primaries, get out there and run whether or not your opponent is a member or your affiliated party or not. Limit the number of nominees to a reasonable amount on a first come first basis. We don’t need a judge or any other authoritative figure to decide. The individual running for office will need to know dates and times to be able to get on that ballot if he/she so chooses and if they don’t do their homework and get registered timely and miss out so be it.
And of course there are those who run for office only to get into the pockets of the big money. Those pockets will no longer be open, which takes away the purchase of elected leaders. We can actually vote and elect the person who really is there to serve our country and the people living here to the best of there ability.
In addition the US Government would pay a set amount to every person wanting to serve the nation as an elected official to use as they see fit in their campaign bid. From the ground up… county, city, state and federal elections. Each nominee would have that set amount given to them; of course that will vary taking into account the individual race. An individual running for city council will not be allocated nor need near as much for his/her campaign as a US Presidential nominee. But all monies coming out of the same arm of the government. We have to stop the buying and selling of people, which is exactly what happens in most elections.
And just maybe most Americans will see the truth behind individuals and elect upstanding politicians who truly want to lead us into the 21st century with the same hopes and dreams are forefathers had before us.
Perhaps the middle class will continue and even creep up to what one Presidential nominee believes is a middle class income in this time in history; which he claims is $200,000 and above. Well I know more than a few people who believe they are middle class (not upper or lower) and are not making anywhere near that amount.
Some politicians are out of touch with reality because they have so much money they haven’t a concept of what middle class wages are and what they pay for in an average ordinary middle class family.
Keep on speaking up and out for us Jim, we appreciate your insight and dedication to the working stiffs of America.
In Solidarity…