| Cross post form Jon Pelto's Wait What?
But since there are still a few days until Election Day, I'd like to re-post a comment that I made earlier this week on Facebook, thanks to the generator at the local community center.
Let us take a moment to IMAGINE a world in which instead of giving $115 million in taxpayer funds to hedge fund criminals, or tens of millions to UBS who then lay-off 10,000 people or giving scarce public funds to the carrion-birds called "ticket-re-sellers," all the while postponing vital transportation projects so the money could be shifted to the transportation fund to cover up the deficit in the General Fund, we actually invested in real infrastructure upgrades like burying key electric lines or creating these so-called micro-grids.
Yes, there would still be many people who would have lost power. There might even be many still without power, but we'd have created thousands of jobs for the workers and crews and suppliers burying those lines or creating those grids and tens of thousands of people would have been able to have spent their week at their jobs, making money and paying taxes.
Instead, we have a $3.9 billion dollar hedge fund CEO and insurance and corporate CEOs collecting extra bonuses, for their ability to make even more money, thanks to our corporate welfare.
And I'm pretty sure none of those CEOs sat in dark houses and lamented the few hundred dollars of food that was rotting in their refrigerators.
If you come across a candidate in the next few days - ask them, tell them, order them - that if they win, they need to place a moratorium on the distribution of corporate welfare and, instead, demand that public funds to be used to create and enhance public benefits.
That is not to say that government should never play a role in helping leverage capital, but Malloy's list of corporate welfare is monstrous and growing, and in many cases will lead to little or no longer-term public benefit. Malloy's list includes;
Alexion: $51 million
Bridgewater Associates: $115 million
CareCentrix: $24 million
Cigna: $71 million
ESPN: $25 million
Jackson Labs $291 million
NBC Sports: $20 million
Sustainable Building Systems/Steel Buildings Systems International: $19 million
TicketMaster: ($ 6 million, removed itself after CEO arrested)
UBS AG $20 million
Blue Sky Studios $3 million
Created a variety of smaller corporate grant programs totaling over $150 million and expanded the Urban and Industrial Site Reinvestment Tax Credit program from $500 million to $750 million.
** More than $800 million of these "investments" are being financed by borrowing the money, meaning taxpayers will be on the hook for about $400 million more in interest payments. |
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