Hello dear reader! I’m going to rant a bit about corporate socialism. This is the high price of living in America. We the people pay taxes to subsidize the rich and famous to insulate them from the market, but we must weather the dangers of capitalism without the benefit of a safety net. What is good for the goose, is not available to us.

Corporate socialism doesn’t exist you say? It does. There is a dirty little word that hides the bitter truth. That word is subsidy. Remember the farm bailout bill for when #45 disrupted the agricultural market. Yes, his rhetoric against Mexico one of the United States’ largest purchaser of grain and agricultural products, caused a dip that required subsidies for farms. I remember a senator in Iowa (Republican) received millions in subsidies. https://fas.usda.gov/regions/mexico Anyway go look at this data. Looks like Biden has been good for trade with Mexico. Farmers must be better off, right? If you ask them, they’ll say no. Why? They are not receiving a handout in the forms of subsidies. They are being exposed to the dangers of capitalism. Agricultural subsidies are a form of corporate welfare. I have nothing against the family farmer. It is the corporate farms and farming businesses that collect these subsidies, while the family farmer gets a very small subsidy credit.

According to Good Jobs First a subsidy tracker website they have quite a list of corporations receiving subsidies to insulate them from the dangers of the capitalist free market. Here are a few that caught my eye.

Meta Platforms (Facebook)-$2.1 Billion (megadeals, property tax abatement, tax exemptions, enterprise zone labels, grants, and tax credits) https://subsidytracker.goodjobsfirst.org/parent/meta-platforms-inc (Really?? Can’t afford your property taxes?))

Walt Disney Corporation-$2.6 Billion (megadeals, tax rebate credits, and grants) https://subsidytracker.goodjobsfirst.org/parent/walt-disney (Really?? You keep your intellectual property rights, but need tax rebates??)

Exxon Mobil-$5.3 Billion (megadeals, tax rebates and credits, enterprise zone, grants, and bailout credits including loans) https://subsidytracker.goodjobsfirst.org/parent/exxon-mobil (Hope you paid those loans back with 9.9% interest like the college students did)

Cheneire Energy-$5.6 Billion mostly from Louisiana (megadeals, property tax abatement, grants, and enterprise zones.) https://subsidytracker.goodjobsfirst.org/parent/cheniere-energy (I think Louisiana needs to fire their state government)

Ford Motor Company-$33.48 Billion (megadeals, property tax abatements, federal grants, bailout loans, tax credits, and state grants) https://subsidytracker.goodjobsfirst.org/parent/ford-motor (You beat Chevy in the subsidy game, Congratulations!!)

These corporate subsidies occur over a number of years, and they encompass local, state, and federal agencies. Therefore your tax monies are being given away under the guise of creating jobs. Are they really creating jobs when the populace they serve is starving for property tax money to support infrastructure and social services including: police, fire, education, library, water, sewer, street maintenance, refuse and recycling collection, and other government services? This, dear reader, is the product of neoliberal economic philosophy allowed to run freely like a wolf in a chicken coop.

States with the largest and smallest amounts of subsidies are:

New York-$59.7 Billion

Louisiana-$40.5 Billion

Hawaii-$329,730

New Hampshire-$10.2 Million https://subsidytracker.goodjobsfirst.org/state-totals

Moral of this revelation for you. Capitalism is good for you unless you are a large corporation that is struggling to redefine itself as the market changes. When you can afford lobbyists and politicians then you can direct governance. This is how you turn the federal, state, and local governments into your personal bank account while your workers must do it on their own.

Whatever happened to laissez faire economics #45 and the conservative coalition? Louisiana’s schools are struggling yet they can give $5.6 Billion to a Texas Energy company!!! How does one sleep at night giving billions away while your populace struggles? This is the myth of trickledown theory and how governance creates jobs. Subsidies are a security blanket to protect investors portfolios (the rich protecting the rich.) Meanwhile the Kingdom of Hawaii really is practicing laissez faire economics for the most part.

Want to fix education in the United States? Let’s eliminate neoliberal subsidies from the entertainment, energy, insurance, manufacturing corporations, factory agricultural firms, etc. Need help when times are tough? Borrow like the rest of us, or pull up those boot straps and work harder. Imagine if we funded education instead of defunding it to feed your money habit? Would we have enough qualified teachers, speech therapists, special needs educators and para-educators?

Imagine if these corporations invested in their communities. How would the infrastructure look? Water and Sewer services? Public buildings? How would the state budgets look? Balanced? Smaller? Could we be paying less in taxes? Possibly…

This is what the United States did when they re-elected #45 again. More corporate socialism. It’s really too bad that those who voted for him don’t know the definitions of subsidy and socialism. I’m still dumbfounded that Meta receives money from subsidies… I dissent on the whole premise of a subsidy… Do what the tax payer does… suck it up and deal with the ebb and flow of economics like us little people.

One last question for the corporate socialists out there. How much money is enough for you? Seriously, how much? Quantify the amount, please… and so it goes…