Date: 2024-06-30 Page is: DBtxt003.php txt00022052
ECONOMICS
PROFITEERING
There will be a Hearing of the Committee on the Budget to consider: 'Corporate Profits are Soaring as Prices Rise: Are Corporate Greed and Profiteering Fueling Inflation?'
PROFITEERING
There will be a Hearing of the Committee on the Budget to consider: 'Corporate Profits are Soaring as Prices Rise: Are Corporate Greed and Profiteering Fueling Inflation?'
Original article: https://www.budget.senate.gov/hearings/corporate-profits-are-soaring-as-prices-rise-are-corporate-greed-and-profiteering-fueling-inflation
Burgess COMMENTARY
I have been waiting a long time for someone to put on the record that inflation is more about profits and profiteering than it is about inflation being pushed by costs. This has been my position on inflation for a long time and articulated by Robert Reich as long ago as the late 1980s. I do not find the GOP Senators credible when it comes to analysis of economics ... or much else ... but they are good at 'marketing' their talking points.
Obviously, some business costs have increased over time, but at the same time a lot of business costs have gone down. The role of technology in helping to lower costs has been in play for about four decades, and in this time productivity has gone up and so have profits. Corporate 'value' as measured by stock prices has reached an all time high, even though many aspects of the economy are in trouble. There is somehow enough profiteering to keep the stock market in bubble territory even though the bulk of consumers and workers are struggling economically.
Two of the witnesses ... Robert B. Reich and Lindsay Owens ... in their testimony address the matter of profiteering in what to me is a very credible way ... but one, Michael Faulkender, from the Trump administration ... takes the view that it is Biden policies and Democrats that are the root cause of the inflation problem. The witnesses written testomony can be downloaded below. In my view Faulkender shows little understanding of how the whole of the economic system actually works. His talking points fit the GOP narrative which is all about political power and little about broadly based socio-economic improvement, and not at all how I see the realities of the present economic situation. !!!!!
Peter Burgess
April 7th, 2022 ... 9:09 AM
Senator Bernie Sanders held a Senate Budget Committee hearing on Tuesday on “Corporate Profits are Soaring as Prices Rise: Are Corporate Greed and Profiteering Fueling Inflation?”
Summarizing the rationale for the hearing, Sanders stated, 'We cannot continue to allow large, profitable corporations to use the war in Ukraine, the Covid-19 pandemic, and the specter of inflation to make outrageous profits by price gouging Americans in every sector of our economy…It's time we discuss how corporate greed and profiteering are fueling inflation.'
Across major sectors, he stated, prices continue to rise – including gasoline, heating oil, used and rental cars, furniture, beef, chicken, and pork. Meanwhile, corporate profits were up 25% in 2021, a record high of nearly $3 trillion.
Committee witnesses and several members referenced the highest corporate profit margins in 70 years. They also cited several earning calls where corporate executives openly spoke to investors about the opportunity to jack up prices. This included a Constellation Brands executive who said the company wants to “make sure that we’re not leaving any pricing on the table. We want to take as much as we can.”
A vast majority of people across the political spectrum, 82%, believe that, “[p]rices are in-part rising because big corporations are jacking up prices, and passing higher costs to consumers while making record profits. Elected officials must take on powerful CEOs and rein in corporate greed to lower prices.” This reflects a reality that 64% of the U.S. population are living paycheck to paycheck.
To address these problems, Sanders and others in Congress have introduced the Ending Corporate Greed Act. Its goal is to end corporate price gouging by imposing a 95% tax on the profits of large companies that top its average profit levers for 2015-19
Yet, all this raises a legitimate question. If corporate greed and profiteering are fueling inflation, what’s ultimately fueling corporate greed and profiteering?
Corporate power - their ability to get away with raising prices knowing they won’t be held accountable.
And what ultimately fuels corporate power?
Corporate constitutional rights - their ability to influence (if not write) the creation or termination of legislation and regulations (e.g., those making it easier for corporations to merge and monopolize sector after sector) or to use the courts to challenge laws and regulations as violations of their “constitutional rights.”
The Ending Corporate Greed Act is necessary. And it could pass if a decent percentage of the above-mentioned 82% of people upset with corporate price gouging press their Representatives and Senators. But even that probably won’t be enough since fossil fuel corporations, pharmaceutical corporations, big agricultural corporations and other corporate beneficiaries of price gouging will fuel up their political campaign contributions and lobbying - thanks to their First Amendment “free speech” and the fact that “corporations are legal persons.” - to prevent the Act from passing, or be watered down to be virtually meaningless.
Organized people in movements are the response to organized money power and corporate power. Its success is most recently demonstrated by the victories in organizing workers at Amazon and Starbucks.
An organized movement to abolish corporate constitutional rights by enacting the We the People Amendment (HJR48) is Move to Amend’s immediate goal. You can help with this by:
- Asking your U.S. Representative to co-sponsor HJR48. Check here to see if (s)he is already a co-sponsor.
- Encourage everyone you know to sign our Motion to Amend petition, at https://www.movetoamend.org/motion
To achieve any of this requires all of us working together. That’s the fuel to build power for real democratic change.
Solidarity,
Jennie, Shelly, George, Leila, Daniel, Saleem, Jessica, Kaitlin, Joni, Milly, Jason, Alfonso, Tara and Greg
Move to Amend
http://www.movetoamend.org/
Move to Amend · PO Box 188617, Sacramento, CA 95818, United States
This email was sent to peterbnyc@gmail.com. To stop receiving emails, click here.
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Original article: https://www.budget.senate.gov/hearings/corporate-profits-are-soaring-as-prices-rise-are-corporate-greed-and-profiteering-fueling-inflation
Hearings
Corporate Profits are Soaring as Prices Rise: Are Corporate Greed and Profiteering Fueling Inflation?
Full Committee Hearing ... Date: Tuesday, April 5, 2022 Time: 11:00 AM ... Location: Room SD-608
Agenda
There will be a Hearing of the Committee on the Budget
- On: Tuesday, April 5, 2022, 11:00 AM
- In: Room SD-608. Members of the Committee may participate in person or by video conference technology.
- To consider: Corporate Profits are Soaring as Prices Rise: Are Corporate Greed and Profiteering Fueling Inflation?
The Committee will follow guidelines developed in consultation with the Office of the Attending Physician and the Senate Rules Committee to protect the health of members, staff, and the public. This includes maintaining six-foot social distance spacing in the meeting room. Pursuant to this guidance, Senate office buildings are not open to the public other than official business visitors and credentialed press at this time. Accordingly, in-person visitors cannot be accommodated at this meeting.
Witnesses
The Honorable Robert B. Reich
Carmel P. Friesen’s Professor Of Public Policy
University of California, Berkley
Download Testimony (PDF)
The Honorable Michael Faulkender, Ph.D.
Dean's Professor Of Finance
University of Maryland
Download Testimony (PDF)
Senate Budget Committee - Main Office
624 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Phone: (202) 224-0642
Fax: (202) 228-2007