In my eyes, I consider the majority of Americans the little guys compared to big corporations like Apple, Walmart, General Electric, and Nike: Which make billions of dollars that we give them. When it comes to paying taxes in America the majority of people do pay theirs. Corporations make million and billions of dollars but do not pay their fair share like the rest of the American people. They make way more than they should because over time corporations have learned over time that they need congressmen to back them up and pass laws that create loopholes so they do not have to pay their 35% in taxes.
So when the time comes for a politician to run in Washington companies are secretly sponsoring the ones that will work in their favor. Corporations wanted to make more money so companies would have branches of their company in tax havens. Tax havens are just countries that have little to no tax in countries. The most common
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These millionaires and billionaires have different intentions they want to make more money and save money as well like in sweatshops. They send manufacturing jobs overseas where they can pay people less than a dollar an hour in unsuitable conditions. "In developing countries, an estimated 168 million children ages 5 to 14 are forced to work."(DoSomething.Org). From personal knowledge learned of being an American, children must be at least the age of 16 with consent from a parent to work. But even then you can only work so many hours at that age.” At least 21 workers died and 50 were hurt when a fire swept through a Bangladeshi factory making clothes for budget retailer H&M and other firms as they worked at night to fulfill orders."(Martin Hickman) Sweatshops are very dangerous places to work in due to lack of safety precautions: for example fire extinguishers, exit doors, and stairs
Look down at the clothes you're wearing right now, chances are almost every single thing you are currently wearing was made in a sweatshop. It is estimated that between 50-75% of all garments are made under sweatshop like conditions. Designers and companies get 2nd party contractors to hire people to work in these factories, this is a tool to make them not responsible for the horrendous conditions. They get away with it by saying they are providing jobs for people in 3rd world countries so its okay, but in reality they are making their lives even worse. These companies and designers only care about their bank accounts so if they can exploit poor, young people from poverty stricken countries they surely will, and they do. A sweatshop is a factory
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.
With the continued rise of consumer "needs" in "industrial" countries such as the United States, and the consistently high price that corporations must pay to produce goods in these countries, companies are looking to "increase (their) profits by driving down costs any way possible... To minimize costs, companies look for places with the lowest wages and human rights protections" (Dosomething). Countries with lax or unenforced labor laws grant multinational corporations the leeway to use cheap foreign labor to mass-produce their commodities so that they can be sold in countries like America. These inexpensive, sometimes borderline illegal, establishments are known as sweatshops. In his book Timmerman discusses the topic of sweatshops in great detail. Originally in search of "where (his) T-shirt was made(;) (Timmerman) (went) to visit the factory where it was made and (met) the people who made (it)" (Timmerman5).
To begin with, improve their working conditions. Promulgated mental and physical abuses sweatshops don’t delivered alleviate poverty. Poor working conditions have been around for centuries. Here in America, we have a stronger labor laws than most undeveloped countries, but it is not free of sweatshops. Reading I found out that many of the factory buildings are crowded, have windowless walls, filthy, back-breaking and hazardous. With little ventilations, heat, and stuffy some factory operators require their employees to work in bad working orders. In my opinion I feel that they are often unaware of their own rights, but have no choice but to continue to work because sweatshop managers threaten to punish them for insubordination. Now labor and human rights activists have been successful at raising public awareness regarding labor practices in both America and off-shore manufacturing facilities. Organizations such as Human Rights Watch, United Students Against Sweatshops, the National Labor Coalition, Sweatshop Watch, and the Interfaith Center of Corporate Responsibility have accused multinational enterprises (MNEs), like Nike, Wal-Mart, Disney, and others of the pernicious exploitation of workers (Arnold and Bowie 221). German philosopher Immanuel Kant said, " Act so that you treat humanity, whether in your own ...
Linda Lim, a professor at the University of Michigan Business School, visited Vietnam and Indonesia in the summer of 2000 to obtain first-hand research on the impact of foreign-owned export factories (sweatshops) on the local economies. Lim found that in general, sweatshops pay above-average wages and conditions are no worse than the general alternatives: subsistence farming, domestic services, casual manual labor, prostitution, or unemployment. In the case of Vietnam in 1999, the minimum annual salary was 134 U.S. dollars while Nike workers in that country earned 670 U.S. dollars, the case is also the similar in Indonesia. Many times people in these countries are very surprised when they hear that American's boycott buying clothes that they make in the sweatshops. The simplest way to help many of these poor people that have to work in the sweatshops to support themselves and their families, would be to buy more products produced in the very sweatshops they detest.
Corporations are thought to have utmost power on shaping how the United States is ran, whether economically, environmentally, or socially. Business dictates in this country how we live, where we live, and unfortunately, if the people of this country are to face good times or bad times. If the economy falters in the United States, which is the foundation of business, then this country will also falter. With this knowledge by big business, the corporations have corporate hegemony; the ability to wield power and the mold making influence on Congress to shape laws and design loopholes for these massive corporations to jump through just in case.
One of the many perks of having a lot of money is being able to donate to political campaigns and/or politicians, most of the time they are in a position to make a policy or law. This can get them laws and bills passed to be in favor of them or their businesses. For example the top 1% was responsible for a quarter of all political donations in 2010, and in turn for all of that generosity they are essentially buying special favors. The wealthy business companies also send a lobbyist over to Washington to lobby or sway lawmakers in Washington to pass certain laws that could help their company make the most money possible. They would have more Factor X than the normal person or even business owner, who otherwise wouldn’t be able to affect the world in such a way or laws for that
Corporations seek out countries with cheap labor forces to lower their production costs. Consequently, they will engage in practices, such as banning labor unions and selecting a passive labor force, which frequently consists of young women, to ensure their policies on low wages are met with little or no resistance. Ultimately, in order to attract investments of multinational corporations, governments in third world nations must compete against each other to exploit their own labor force to supply the cheapest products. Furthermore, instead of sharing the profits with the workers, corporations spend most of the money saved from the labors on advertising and celebrity spokespeople.
The world of business is a dog-eat-dog world, some may win and some may lose. Large capitalist corporations take a great deal of revenue away from the local businesses. Big businesses dominate the American government and have much more influence and power than small businesses. By defining the importance of recognizing that big businesses has been dominating the government, by refuting those who claim that big businesses do not influence government practices and policies, and by presenting sound arguments and extensive research to show the damage big business has done to society and the influence it has on America’s governing body, one will be persuaded that big businesses has dominated the American government
...ther words, politicians are corporate whores and corporations are political whores. This blending of corporate and political interests creates an economic whoredom that favors the super wealthy. All while the vast majority of Americans are marred in the chains of political discrimination.
Americans do not realize the amount of clothing we wear on a daily basis is actually made in Cambodia, such as Adidas and even the Gap. The women that work for these sweatshops in Cambodia sew for 50 cents an hour, which is what allows stores in America, such as H&M to sell inexpensive clothing (Winn, 2015). The conditions these Cambodian workers face are a noisy, loud, and extremely hot environment where people are known for having huge fainting attacks. When workers were on strike a year ago, authorities actually shot multiple people just because they were trying to raise their pay. There is plenty of evidence of abuse captured through many interviews of workers from different factories, and is not just a rarity these places see often or hear of. Factories hire children, fire pregnant women because they are slow and use the bathroom to much, scream at regular workers if they use the toilet more than two times a day, scam hard working employees with not paying them their money they worked for and more, and workers are sent home and replaced if 2,000 shirts are not stitched in one day. Expectations are unrealistic and not suitable for employees to be working each day for more than ten
Capitalism is an economic system in which the production and distribution are privately owned, the government involvement is minimal,and there is free enterprise. In Capitalism, the means of production are privately owned and operated for profit in a competitive market. Also the economic investment, ownership and profits are all owned by individuals. Under capitalism the state is separated from the economy, which means that the government has no role in business. In other words, everyone works for themselves. The market forces in a capitalist country runs by supply and demand which it determines the price and later on it turns into profits. Supply is the quantity of goods and services a business is willing to sell, while Demand is the quantity of goods and services consumers are willing to buy. Therefore, Capitalism is the best economic system because it rewards the ones that work hard and since the government does not control trade, there is a large variety of goods and creates options for consumers to fit their personal needs.
A tax haven is a country that offers foreign corporations and individuals relatively low corporate and income tax rates, with a politically and economically stable environment. Some tax havens are Switzerland, Hong Kong, Bermuda, Ireland, and the Cayman Islands. The United States government has been fighting against the movement of corporations because it is not collecting taxes from these corporations that it could have used to reduce government debt. However, corporations have found loopholes that exempt them from United States tax laws. Companies are moving their headquarters across seas for tax benefits to keep their shareholders content. The United States government needs to reduce its corporate tax system so the country does not lose more companies, jobs, and money to foreign entities.
Corporations have far more power than most Americans know of. Large and powerful corporations dominate the American economy. Corporations have a lot of power and influence in the government, it’s possible that they have more influence than government. With so much power and control, corporations are involved with many factors of everyday life. Corporations are involved in food, jobs, water and even our healthcare system. With so much power and control comes problems. Corporations cause major issues in all of these areas.
These concerns typically include the rights of the children, the responsibility of the parents and employers, and the well-being and safety of the children. In Stefan Spath’s “The Virtues of Sweatshops,” it is made very clear that he, like many others, feel that the general public is highly misinformed on what sweatshops are and what they actually contribute to their respective communities. In the eyes of someone from a developed country, sweatshops and child labor that takes place in them seem primitive and are interpreted as simply a means by which companies can spend less money on employers. He states that when labor unions claim that companies which establish operations in developing nations create unemployment in America, they aren’t really explaining the whole story. The author claims that those who are adamantly protest sweatshops are only telling half the story with a claim like this. He points out in this part that the American people can rest assured that high skilled jobs will not be taken over to developing countries because “– high-skilled jobs require a level of worker education and skills that poorer countries cannot