From the equality of rights springs identity of our highest interests; you cannot subvert your neighbor's rights without striking a dangerous blow at your own. Carl Schurz

Sunday, June 14, 2015

Of false equivalencies

  Whenever people talk about removing the influence of money from our political system they invariably lump unions in with corporations as if the two exert equal influence on the decision making process.

If this were true we wouldn't have seen the explosive rise in the precariat. Another separator is what each lobbies for and on behalf of.

Corporations lobby exclusively for themselves and bottom line thus against the interests of the people. Unions on the other hand represent the working class and disenfranchised, lobbying for the betterment of the majority of society.

By lumping the two together what ends up happening is corporations continue to exert outsized influence on politicians and government while unions and the majority are effectively shut out of the process.

Corporations through being able to reward compliant pols with lucrative positions after they leave office have other avenues of influence not available to unions. When was the last time you read of a pol like Baird quitting to go work for a union.

But not content with this advantage corporations have learned how to game the system 

SNC-Lavalin is defending $15,000 in political donations made during the 2011 federal election to a Conservative candidate by at least 12 company executives and two family members
There are other examples of Conservative ridings with zero chance of winning receiving tens of thousands of dollars in similar donations only to see much of that transferred to other more important ridings.

So by all means lets get the influence of big money out of our system but keep in mind one type of money is a problem the other isn't Equating the two is wrong and only ends up causing more damage.

The amount of money from unions compared to corporate dollars is dwarfed by the power of infinity 
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4 comments:

  1. susansmithJune 14, 2015 at 1:38 PM

    Great read Kiev. Social unionism does this in spades: "Unions on the other hand represent the working class and disenfranchised, lobbying for the betterment of the majority of society."
    However, as unionism workforces decline this voices of solidarity become less, their ability to influence becomes less.

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    Replies
    1. KevJune 14, 2015 at 1:46 PM

      Which is why it makes no sense to restrict unionism's ability to support the pols it sees as beneficial to it's causes unless of course the goal is to do just that

      Delete
  2. KevJune 26, 2015 at 7:22 AM

    Sadly no

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  3. sebastianAugust 11, 2015 at 10:49 PM

    They do have equal influence... not so much not in Britain, but yes!

    And both influence too much the wrong decision being made.

    Ed Milliband voted in, when his brother would have narrowly won the General Election, and now we are faced with a Conservative far right government.

    The Unions are at least partly to blame.

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