[quote]swoleupinya wrote:
I normally avoid responding to Zeb, but this is just retarded… I can’t help myself.
Agriculture - subsidized to maintain stable production, protected from foreign competition via tariffs, largely owned by a few conglomerates. Here’s a piece I found in about 10 seconds on the influence of big-agra:
http://www.helium.com/items/1385745-big-ag-and-the-usda-how-they-built-the-national-animal-identification-system
Pharmaceutical industry - propped up at the research level by public institutions of higher learning, propped up at the market level by contractual pricing structures with major government entities like medicare. They are also given a pass on many degrees of import taxation, even though much of their development and production is overseas.
Oil - This industry did not exist before it was subsidized with major tax incentives… the cost of development was simply too high for anyone to take the risk. Much of early oil exploration was actually initiated under favorable land-use agreements related to a mining boom in the western US that the federal government expected to spur the economy… it did, but it also forever set the precedent that mining and oil exploration would take place with states and municipalities being strong-armed by the federal government to wave property rights to the parts of the common wealth for a fraction of their worth.
Another industry to consider is telecommunications. The entire telecom infrastructure of this nation was built with direct subsidization. This only changed with the development of cellular technologies and networks… although, realistically cellular networks cannot exist without the robust backbone that was originally built for the “bells.” Even when the market was “deregulated” in the mid 80’s, the government subsidized development of technologies and retrofitting of networks via tax incentives.
Don’t even get me started on the defense industry…[/quote]
Are you suggesting that the government should not have a close relationship with the defense industry? I’m thankful for that one.
Agriculture: Government currently subsidizes US farmers to the tune of 20 billion per year, no small amount. But they sell well over 200 billion in products each year around the world. And that makes the US farmer the most productive in the history of the world. Does the fact that government subsidizes them 10% of this number mean that they’re “in bed” with them? And would yuo change it if you could?
Pharmaceutical: Americans spend about 200 billion per year on prescription drugs. This has risen dramatically and is obviously the number one reason that the pharmaceutical industry is doing so well. And recently the pharmaceutical industry has become the biggest defrauder of the federal government under the false claims act. The government has responded with fines and other penalties. If this is being in bed with the government someone might want to tell the pharmaceutical companies and the US government to stop fighting for the covers.
Oil: The US is fining BP into the billions for their recent fiasco. If they are somehow in bed with them this is one more rocky relationship. There have been other such stiff fines and penalties for far less infractions than this.
I think what you may view as the government “being in bed” with certain companies is nothing more than a relationship that has to exist at a somewhat symbiotic level. That doesn’t mean that either respect the other, nor does it mean that government given the opportunity would not steal, take or intimidate millions, or billions from said companies.
Also the four industry’s which you’ve chosen comprise only a small part of the entire business world. The original accusation is that “government is in bed with business”. Maybe you better give me your definition of what being in bed means. Or perhaps tighten it up to mean that certain industries get more favorable treatment than other industries.
For example, I don’t see the US government handing Walmart any money. In fact, local and state governments have tried to make it quite difficult for them to do business in certain parts of the country. There are many industries who have had to deal with restrictive government red tape and other government hurdles just to stay in business. Far from being in bed with government many such businesses feel that government is trying to crush them.