This Presidential election cry from the left is "Fair share! Tax the rich!!" and "No more tax breaks for the wealthy!" Let's address how that money that the government would like to get their BIG GRUBBY paws on is spent by the "rich". We, the middle and lower class, have only numbers that are not applicable to our lifestyle to go on. $100 Million is a number we can't put to use in our mind. Anything over $1 million or, for that matter, a lump sum of $100,000 and we think we'd be in good shape.
The town I grew up in and the surrounding communities for many years enjoyed an employer that had the capacity to employ just about everyone that wanted to work. An internationally recognized papermill with an abundance of natural resources and renewable energy (hydroelectric). All of the improvements done to the mills in the 100+ years it ran strong were paid for by the rich, fat cats who held the profits. Investment in that little town cemented their fortunes. Dams were built for more power, equipment bought/upgraded and investment made in employees. Money makes money.
The unions, at first trying to improve worker safety, challenged the administrative powers at the mill and did indeed win and make it a safer place to work. Now that it was a safe place to work, the union decided that it needed to press social issues. The people at the top had investment and were good stewards of their money, so retirement was going to be comfortable for them. For the workers it was a different story. They felt that they needed a more comprehensive retirement program, double time on sundays/holidays/call ins, paid medical dental/vision, all the perks and negotiated such. One person asking for a performance perk that seems reasonable it leads
to another, to another..until all of the people think they are entitled
to that perk. All of a sudden, a performance bonus becomes a directed
bonus to all. What was once a 1% budgetary expense becomes a 25% balloon
payment for no discernible reason. However, the workers had a group (the international union) that is NOT good stewards with money negotiate on their behalf. The result was a system that at first looked and seemed like a wonderful, perpetuating program that would take workers and retirees into their golden years with everything they needed. But it was all smoke and mirrors. The system was built to be self supporting.
These deals were made at the height of the mills profitability. As it is with all things, things changed. Eventually there we're more retirees than there was workers. The system that the union had negotiated could no longer support itself. As the mills found themselves getting crushed under new social debt, new regulatory controls came along at a dizzying pace with the founding of the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970. Forced investment in unproven technology to 'clean' the water/air and waste prevented investment in basic infrastructure of the mills. A very large dam proposal was shot down and the power needs for the mills could not be supported without supplemental power generation that was expensive. All aspects of the day to day financials of the mills started to skew towards lower profits. The people that had the capacity and capital to run and improve the mills dumped their controlling ownership. It was no longer lucrative to own a paper mill in Maine. The wealthy took their investments somewhere else. The 1980s was the last time the mills would have the capacity to hire just about all of the high school graduates in the area.
Now, out of the two mills in that area, only one is running. It employs 250 employees and is a mere shadow of it's former glory of over 5500 direct employees. It's been said that at the height of it's glory the mills employed direct and indirectly over 20,000 people. At one point the town I grew up in had over 13,000 residents and now it's under 5000.
While I believe that it's really a good thing that the towns respect this employer, it was not always so. I'm sure that many of the people in my small town will take offense to this. Those towns, both of them, have always been a bit protective of themselves and their way of life. What this post charges is that they were also their own undoing. The very people that had such a protective attitude of their situation had a hand in it's destruction.
We now hear on the national stage about corporate greed. Well, I'm here to charge us all with individual greed. It's individual greed that pulls down large companies. Eventually we'll have no one to invest in companies besides the government. We see how that's working out. The Obama administration has invested $26 billion in companies that have led to huge bankruptcies on the back of the tax payer, huge contracts that took jobs over-seas and outright loss. The power hungry politicians should not be picking winners and losers in our capitalist society. The government can't even balance it's own budget..what makes us think it'll be able to run a business?
And now they want us to believe that if the rich pay more, it will make it all better. If you take money from the rich then they won't invest that money into PAPER MILLS in Maine. They won't create businesses to support those ventures or the people that live in those areas. The only reason that 'Trickle Down' economics never seem to work, is because there's a middle man grabbing drops on the way by. He's old, white beard, top hat and suit that's made out of an American flag. That's right people...Uncle Sam. He's ripping us off an all you people that live off a the drops that make it through let him get away with it for fear the drops will stop. Sheep.
That's my two cents, spend 'em or put 'em in the dish for the next person.
