Corporate State

615 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: What role does the US government play in our economy

The rise of the corporate state has been happening since the founding of this nation. The federal government has been involved in helping out big business since the times of Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson and it continues through today. From using federal troops to break labor strikes in the mid-1800s to bailing out failing Savings & Loan programs in the 1980’s, the federal government has been the perfect “big brother” to big business and its owners. This has resulted in corporations and their owners rising to an even higher status, tax free, and interest free lifestyle.

With the beginning of industrialization in the United States, business owners here have been looking to the federal government for a helping hand not only to bail them out of trouble but also just to boost their profits. At a time when “children as young as nine and ten toiled 14-hour shifts” and “adolescent girls labored from six in the morning until midnight for three dollars a week”, the government has been in the business of helping the rich oppress workers by breaking up unions with federal troops (Parenti 64).

World War I escalated the relationship between big business and the federal government. Defense and weapons contractors made vast amounts of profit from producing supplies for the war effort while the worker came home with very little. Instead of federal troops, courts were now being used to break up unions.

Tax credits, low interest loans, and government overspending are only a few of the ways in which the government is currently lending a hand to big business. The capitalist state uses taxation as well as public spending to redistribute income in an upward direction (Parenti 80). The tax codes have been written with every attempt to make life for big business and the capitalist class a lot easier. The government’s overspending is also out of control. The military was paying $1,868 for a toilet cover, $999 for a pair of pliers, and $668,000 for a fax machine (Parenti 89).

The government now uses the military to oppress other nations in order to build a road for the great train of Capitalism. In the name of Democracy, the U.S. military now overthrows “dictatorships” in small countries that take from the rich and give to the poor. We now “help” smaller countries by making it easy for American businesses to relocate to those countries to destroy their living environment and exploit their workers.

Show More
Related

  • Upton Sinclair's The Jungle: The Progressive Era

    735 Words  | 2 Pages

    The period of time running from the 1890’s through the early 1930’s is often referred to as the “Progressive Era.” It was a time where names such as J.P. Morgan, Andrew Carnegie, Jay Gould and John D. Rockefeller stood for the progress of America and their great contributions to American industry and innovation. This chapter however, has a much darker side. Deplorable working conditions, rampant political corruption and power hungry monopolies and trusts threatened the working class of America and the steady influx of European immigrants hoping to make a better life for themselves and their families. What started as a grass-roots movement pushing for political reform at the local and municipal levels soon began to encompass

    Read More

  • Gilded Age Dbq Essay

    1434 Words  | 3 Pages

    The growth of large corporations had impacted American politics by causing governmental corruption because of the power some industries had in society. Since the government had used laissez faire in the late 1800s for the big businesses to...

    Read More

  • Grapes of Wrath and It's a Wonderful Life

    1093 Words  | 3 Pages

    With World War I freshly over, there was joy and celebration to welcome American 'boys' coming back home. Huge technological improvements and scientific breakthroughs paved the way for larger, more stable and profitable financial markets. Fast and easy money was too be made by playing the booming stock market - many lay men took advantage of these opportunities without having a complete understanding of what exactly they were doing. This inevitably led to the crash that sent America and the world into the Great Depression.

    Read More

  • Women During The Gilded Age Essay

    534 Words  | 2 Pages

    During the Gilded Age, industrial capitalism (known as the 2nd industrial revolution) became the driving force to transforming the economies in Europe and in the United States. Industrial capitalism was also the foundation for creating a global economy. Many of the business practices and profits derived from commercial capitalism and industrial capitalism. These profits came from machinery, technology, large factories and processing plants. Even though progress and profits came with the Gilded Age, it also brought tensions, conflicts and misery. It also sparked an unbalance social and economic order for workers’ wages and working conditions. This period in history brought heavy masses of immigration to the country. In addition, continuous struggles and ongoing between labor, capital and increased growth in urbanization. Today, we see these similarities and

    Read More

  • 1920s: The Roaring Decade

    1722 Words  | 4 Pages

    World War I may not have made the world safe for democracy, but it did help to lay the groundwork for a decade of American economic expansion. The war began in Europe in 1914, and the United States entered the fray in 1917. The 1920s saw the growth of the culture of consumerism. A significant reason for United States involvement in the war was the nation’s economic links to the Allied Powers, and especially to Great Britain. American soldiers returned home in May 1919 with the promise of a prosperous decade (Baughman 197).

    Read More

  • Impact of US involvement in World War I

    721 Words  | 2 Pages

    Although wages rose during the war, prices also rose by sixty percent. Because European farm production was disrupted, the United States' agricultural prices rose more than fifty percent between 1913 and 1918, and farmers' income increased significantly. Many farmers saw this as a great opportunity to bring in wealth and borrow money to expand production, but when the high prices of agricultural merchandise decreased, planters faced a credit squeeze.      While most men were off at war, many women and blacks took over their jobs, contributing intensely to the Great War, also known as World War I.

    Read More

  • The Early 20th Century Labor Movement

    1115 Words  | 3 Pages

    Factory workers of this time had very little freedom. Aside from having to work outrageous hours for 6 days of the week, there was no job security, no solid way to survive day-to-day, and if a family member were to suffer an accident, families had no financial means to carry on. In the early 1900s, there were no labor laws, including the right to organize, an eight-hour day, safety standards, or unemployment/disability pensions. M...

    Read More

  • We, the Corporations, of the United States of America

    1571 Words  | 4 Pages

    At first glance, it seems implausible the word democracy isn't written in the United States Constitution, or in the Preamble of the Constitution, or even in the Declaration of Independence. One would assume a concept so paramount to modern American culture would surely be derived from one of its oldest and most endeared documents. Alas, it is not. The Constitution only specifically mentions two entities, the government and “We the People”. Defining government is an easy enough task, but who are “We the People”? Originally consisting of only white male property owners, eventually adding in other races, income classes, women, and astonishingly, corporations, the definition of “We the People” has evolved numerous times. Corporation is another key term the architects of our government failed to define for us, perhaps that is why it found its way into the phrase “We the People”. A grave dilemma lies in this fallible defining of terms. Granting corporations person-hood legislatively shifts the power of democracy from human interests to corporate interests. This corrosion of human interest can clearly be noted when examining the battle over corporate power highlighted in the court cases of Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, and United States v. Sourapas and Crest Beverage Company.

    Read More

  • Avarice In America

    460 Words  | 1 Pages

    When the topic of American economics arises, the infamous Robber Barons of the 19th Century often springs to mind. They are often glorified as "Captains of Industry" for their money making strategies and enterprising methods. Those who hold this view probably do not know the evils of the laissez-faire capitalism in which the Robber Barons believed and participated. They wanted an unrestricted system of economics so that they could amass as much money as they could to out do each other and control the power in society. They were not as glorious and generous as some people make them out to have been.

    Read More

  • Labor Unions During The Gilded Age

    891 Words  | 2 Pages

    The United States’s industrialization lead to a great boom in both economic and population growth, allowing businesses to flourish. With more money and workers at their disposal, employers often would often mistreat workers, suddenly cutting their wages or firing them. With only profit in mind, industries eventually became monopolized and the conditions of workers only worsened. Defenseless and barely able to survive, laborers soon found power in uniting with each other, leading to the establishment of American labor unions during the Gilded Age. They provided workers with necessary protection from their employers’ capricious decisions, and while their presence elicited fear in business owners, unions eventually bettered the standard of living for the American proletarian through compromise.

    Read More

  • The Fire That Changed America

    736 Words  | 2 Pages

    Businesses and large corporations were essential to the economy of the United States but concealed their genuine intentions. Factory owners provided jobs and income to the household of not only the American people, but also immigrants. In addition, the government believed that corporate owners are crucial since they’re the backbone of productivity which stimulates the economy. On the contrary, David Von Drehle spilled the dirty work of industrial owners. Competition among businesses is known to be a healthy act but it was a hindrance for owners to become even richer. They generated the practice of monopoly, which occurs when a corporation owns all the market of given merchandise, by lowering the prices of commodities until their competitors close down. It was very common in the urban areas of New York state considering that “there were more than five hundred blouse factories [since] the waist industry was booming” (8). After a successful scheme of shutting down other businesses, monopoly owners began to increase prices and in...

    Read More

  • Terence V. Powderly

    933 Words  | 2 Pages

    In order for this progress to occur in post-Civil War America, the people had to see how the current conditions of the country, poverty, segregation and racism, and poor working atmosphere were hindering the potential progress of the free workforce. Furthermore, the Depression of 1873 hit the U.S. economy very hard, and Powderly was one of the countless workers l...

    Read More

  • The Capitalists Who Shaped Post-Civil War America

    972 Words  | 2 Pages

    Accurately established by many historians, the capitalists who shaped post-Civil War industrial America were regarded as corrupt “robber barons”. In a society in which there was a severe imbalance in the dynamics of the economy, these selfish individuals viewed this as an opportunity to advance in their financial status. Thus, they acquired fortunes for themselves while purposely overseeing the struggles of the people around them. Presented in Document A, “as liveried carriage appear; so do barefooted children”, proved to be a true description of life during the 19th century. In hopes of rebuilding America, the capitalists’ hunger for wealth only widened the gap between the rich and poor.

    Read More

  • 1890-1910 American Imperialism

    1117 Words  | 3 Pages

    The US imperialism has intervened in several countries to open more doors for investment, control, and profit. On this way, military has acted as a catalyzer. Moreover, the national policies in market

    Read More

  • Why Corporations Are Bad for America

    862 Words  | 2 Pages

    A corporation was originally designed to allow for the forming of a group to get a single project done, after which it would be disbanded. At the end of the Civil War, the 14th amendment was passed in order to protect the rights of former slaves. At this point, corporate lawyers worked to define a corporation as a “person,” granting them the right to life, liberty and property. Ever since this distinction was made, corporations have become bigger and bigger, controlling many aspects of the economy and the lives of Americans. Corporations are not good for America because they outsource jobs, they lie and deceive, and they knowingly make and sell products that can harm people and animals, all in order to raise profits.

    Read More

More about Corporate State

Open Document