If a Corporation (BP) Pleads Guilty to Manslaughter, Who Goes to Prison? | AllGov | Noel Brinkerhoff
Pleading guilty to killing someone usually means going to prison…unless the perpetrator is a corporation.
This week, BP agreed to 11 counts of manslaughter for…
‘Too Big to Fail’ banks including JP Morgan Chase, U.S. Bancorp and Bank of America have seized on an opportunity to profit off the nation’s jobless by siphoning millions of dollars in fees from state unemployment programs, according to a new report by the National Consumer Law Center.
Privatizing the task of distributing unemployment benefits, the banks have created a “fee-heavy” check card system. Instead of having payments deposited directly to bank accounts or recieving checks sent in the mail from their state governments, individuals across the nation are increasingly forced to use costly bank issued payment cards that are loaded with a “plethora” of costly fees for the recipient.
The large banks pitched the operation to states as a scheme that would “save millions in overhead costs” but have instead externalized such costs to America’s jobless.
The Associated Press reports:
People are using the fee-heavy cards instead of getting their payments deposited directly to their bank accounts. That’s because states issue bank cards automatically, require complicated paperwork or phone calls to set up direct deposit and fail to explain the card fees, according to a report issued Tuesday by the National Consumer Law Center, a nonprofit group that seeks to protect low-income Americans from unfair financial-services products. […]
Banks make more money when more people use the cards. In the past, some of their deals with states prevented states from offering direct deposit, or required states to promote the card program as a first option.
To cover the cost of issuing cards and running the programs, banks charge a plethora of fees, including charges for balance inquiries, phone calls to customer support, leaving an account inactive for a period of months, or making a purchase using a personal identification number.
Read more on this story here.
(via theyoungradical)
Nike Hired Military to Intimidate Company Workers in Indonesia
Workers at a Nike shoe factory in Indonesia say the factory paid military personnel to intimidate them into working for less than the minimum wage.
After millions of workers went on strike last year in Indonesia over low pay and cost of living increases, the government lifted wage rates.
But workers at the Nike factory in the west Java city of Sukabumi say they were made to sign a petition supporting the factory’s claim to be exempt from paying the new wage.
In mobile phone footage of the factory, shown to the ABC, a man standing over workers can be heard telling them, “you all have to sign it”.
The woman who took the footage does not want to be named, but says she and other workers tried to reject the pay restriction.
“We got summoned by military personnel that the company hired to interrogate us and they intimidated us,” she said.
“The first thing that scared me was his high tone of voice and he banged the table.
“And also he said that inside the factory there were a lot of military intelligence officers. That scared me.”
Unions in Indonesia say at least six Nike-contracted factories have applied to be exempt from paying the increased rate.
The Trade Union Rights Centre’s Surya Tjandra says there is a loophole to get an exemption.
“You have to provide financial conditions of the company in the last two years which show some not profit, and then you have to accept some consent from the workers directly, which is not that easy because for the workers, the new wages is actually better and fairer,” he said.
If the factory gets an exemption, the employees will get paid $3.70 a day instead of $4.
Activists say that after rent and transport to work, it is only enough to afford one meal.
(via theyoungradical)
During a private fundraiser earlier this year, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney told a small group of wealthy contributors what he truly thinks of all the voters who support President Barack Obama. He dismissed these Americans as freeloaders who pay no taxes, who don’t assume responsibility for their lives, and who think government should take care of them. Fielding a question from a donor about how he could triumph in November, Romney replied:
There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That that’s an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what…These are people who pay no income tax.
(Source: waitingonoblivion, via politicsd00d)
(Source: mainstreamrevolution)
“I came to the United States on an H-2B guestworker visa from my home in Tamaulipas, Mexico. I work in a small town in Louisiana with other guestworkers, peeling crawfish for a company called C.J.’s Seafood, which sells 85% of its products to Walmart. Our boss forces us to work up to 24 hours at a time with no overtime pay. No matter how fast we work, they scream and curse at us to make us work faster. Our supervisor threatens to beat us with a shovel to stop us from taking breaks. We live in trailers across from the boss’s house, and we’re under surveillance all the time. The supervisors come into our trailers without warning, and they threaten to fire us if we leave after 9 p.m. The supervisor also locked us in the plant so we couldn’t take breaks. We want to work. We need to support our families. But we also want to be treated like human beings”
- Ana Rosa Diaz, 40
Sign the Petition to tell Walmart that these abuses are unacceptable and MUST stop!
Jesus
This post is in relation to this post. Even though I reblogged the other post the link leads to the source post.
This is the reason why I get so pissed whenever people try to tell me that Wal-Mart is a “grassroots” company and that we should support Wal-Mart because of it. >:(
We’ve spent the year examining the theme of “Health, Wellness, and the Pursuit of Happiness”. Thanks to a variety of interesting and provocative lectures, films, readings, and classroom discussions, our understanding of happiness has increased greatly, although we’ll probably never fully know what makes us happy. One thing is for sure, though: austerity is not a pathway to bliss.
The Greek suicide rate in 2010 rose by 18 percent. In Athens last year it rose by 25 percent. Before austerity, Greece had the lowest suicide rate in the EU. In February a woman threatened to leap from her office window when the latest round of public job cuts included her and her husband. In the end she didn’t go through jump.
(via theyoungradical)
April 4, 2012 | By Will Allen and Ronnie Cummins | via @CyranoNymous
The world’s most hated corporation is at it again, this time in Vermont.
Despite overwhelming public support and support from a clear majority of Vermont’s Agriculture Committee, Vermont legislators are dragging their feet on a proposed GMO labeling bill. Why? Because Monsanto has threatened to sue the state if the bill passes.
The popular legislative bill requiring mandatory labels on genetically engineered food (H-722) is languishing in the Vermont House Agriculture Committee, with only four weeks left until the legislature adjourns for the year. Despite thousands of emails and calls from constituents who overwhelmingly support mandatory labeling, despite the fact that a majority (6 to 5) of Agriculture Committee members support passage of the measure, Vermont legislators are holding up the labeling bill and refusing to take a vote.
Instead, they’re calling for more public hearings on April 12, in the apparent hope that they can run out the clock until the legislative session ends in early May.
What happened to the formerly staunch legislative champions of Vermont’s “right to know” bill? They lost their nerve and abandoned their principles after Monsanto representative recently threatened a public official that the biotech giant would sue Vermont if they dared to pass the bill.
More on Food | AlterNet
(Source: anonymissexpress, via theyoungradical)
Democracy Now! talks to investigative reporter Greg Palast about a controversy in the banking community around the Occupy Wall Street movement. Palast investigates the story behind Goldman Sachs’ recent decision to pull out of a fundraiser for the Lower East Side People’s Federal Credit Union in New York City after it learned the event was honoring the protesters at Occupy Wall Street. The investment bank withdrew its name from the fundraiser and also canceled a $5,000 pledge. Was the $5,000 a Goldman Sachs donation or actually American taxpayer bail-out money Goldman set aside for community banks?
Occupy Wallstreet - clearly a successful initiative, if it has Goldman Sachs threatening People’s banks, and retracting money that by law has to be circulated to them.
Occupy Wallstreet - keep SHOUTing - this is only the beginning
(via citizensaci)
This man has a point!
Yea. This man has a major point… (Seriously, do your research or even just look at the world around you! That isn’t to say I believe in everything he says all the time. But this video is a seriously valid point.)
——
Never give yourselves to a few, it never works. There are too many of us to let so few people have power. If we do that, there will always be an agenda forced upon us. We don’t need control and power, we need freedom and to just give a damn about each other.
For myself, I want a world where everyone can all have a voice and co-operate. Not one where a few people tell us we are uniting under one roof, and control every aspect of our lives. Or that you have to listen to those in charge at the top of some system that will be your word, because they know what or who you need/want/are.
Never give yourselves to control. It wont help anyone and doesn’t work.
Louisiana bans using cash in sales of second-hand goodsoccupyx
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/10/20/louisiana-bans-using-cash-to-buy-second-hand-goods/
This is what we’re headed for all over the country of the OWS movement fails. Forced to be slaves to banks, forced to participate in the genocide of small business, forced to be tracked constantly by the ruling plutocracy.
Get to your local Occupy ASAP—we have a country to save, and we need to do it together.
