Corporate Welfare
Annie Williams
Prof. Montes
Intro. to Sociology SSS101
The article by Donald Barlett and James Steele goes on to explain how the government
is responsible for creating money sucking vampires out of the most influential corporations of
the nation by granting them economic aide when they least need it. Corporate welfare is the
financial aid that is granted to powerful corporations who, at many times, claim to need
financial support from the government with the excuse that they hold the interest of the
nations’ people at heart.
The article goes on to explain that many times the average person is not aware of these
bail outs because they are worded in ways to describe their true goal, such as “economic
development or public-private partnerships”. In average, yearly, the federal government is
responsible for giving out over 125 billion dollars in corporate welfare to major companies
throughout the nation.
The federal government has also been very lenient in the way it taxes or charges
interest to these companies. At times the amount of interest implemented on the great
financial loans handed to these companies can be nearly non-existent. Also, when companies
claim that they are going to build new factories that will create new and better jobs for the
people of the nation, the government is quick to lend money to these companies believing their
“interest in the people”. In realty, these big corporations are looking out for their own benefit.
Research conducted over the years on many of the corporations who have been granted
economic help shows that it is these major corporations that have been responsible for the
majority of the jobs that have been lost during this sad period of economic downfall, the article
states that over one third of a million jobs have been lost.
According to the book In Conflict and Order chapter 10, the purpose behind the 1996
reformation of the welfare system was to stop the dependency of people on the financial aid
provided by the government. They claimed that people who were on welfare were being taught
to be lazy and not work and simply depend on the government for financial support. The
average person who was on the welfare system was now granted a maximum period of two
years of financial support, time during which they were to find jobs that will be able to support
them and their families. This was all done in vain because research goes on to show that many
of the people on welfare support actually had other means of financial support and were
usually off of welfare before the two year period.
Corporate welfare needs to be reformed as well. If the government is to continue to use
the slogan “for the people by the people”, it should look out for the interest of the all the
people not just the elite few. The poor have been and continue to be treated in a bias manner,
looked on with preconceived notions all because they were not born with the many advantages
of the members of the upper class society. Corporate welfare is simply on example of how the
wealthy are treated different and granted special rights that the average person is denied
simply because they are not considered to be worthy of help. Instead of reforming the welfare
system that is used to “help” the underprivileged then we should focus our attention on
reforming the welfare we give to corporations who are affluent to begin with. This way at least
when we wish to appease our conscience and say that we have done our part in looking out for
the well being of the nation we can be assured that we really are helping the people of the
nation and not just the elite few.