Corporations Are Not Good Citizens

The recent announcement that credit cards will be issued to anyone that has a IRS number - with advertising stating that a Social Security Number is not required is an indication of what I am going to state next.

Corporations are not good citizens unless it pays to be a good citizen.

The goal of any corporation is to make money. Using the credit card example, this corporation is doing two things: Not behaving as a good citizen, and attempting to wring money from those on the absolute lowest rung of society. The interest rates are exorbitant. It permits a terrorist entering the country illegally to purchase an airline ticket via credit card circumventing one the possible identifiers of an airline hijacker.

Corporations are not altruistic, are not your mother, and do not care at all for any employees except what affects the bottom line. It is the nature of a corporation. When profits become slim, the corporations look for ways to cut their costs. This will mean breaking promises to retired employees, current employees, cutting back employees, moving money around - including illegal book-keeping. The other tactic is foist responsibility for retired employees onto the taxpayers. It all works.

Misbehavior of corporations can result in legislation that will limit, halt and cause legal problems if the law is not followed. There are many cases where corporations knowingly disobeyed the law as the fines or punishment for doing so were substantially less than the profits or benefits earned illegally. It happens all of the time. It is a corporate decision to operate illegally based upon profit motives.

Our elected officials representing the "us" are lobbied by corporations that have absolutely no voting power. The corporations vote with money, jobs, through employees and hired lobbyists. It appears that the country is currently being operated at the behest of corporate USA.

We need corporations, but it would certainly be better if all corporations were good citizens and thus require less of our tax money to police, limit, and restrict their activity. Don't you become tired of reading about corporate misdeeds?

The leaders of US corporations are the highest paid individuals of all world corporations. It would be nice if they earned the pay they receive through making their corporations good citizens.