Wednesday, January 09, 2013

Ross Gittins: The four business gangs that run the US


Ross Gittins
Ross Gittins, The Sydney Morning Herald’s Economics Editor

smh.com.au, Dec 31, 2012

Illustration: Michael Mucci.
Illustration: Michael Mucci.

IF YOU’VE ever suspected politics is increasingly being run in the interests of big business, I have news: Jeffrey Sachs, a highly respected economist from Columbia University, agrees with you – at least in respect of the United States.

In his book, The Price of Civilisation, he says the US economy is caught in a feedback loop. ”Corporate wealth translates into political power through campaign financing, corporate lobbying and the revolving door of jobs between government and industry; and political power translates into further wealth through tax cuts, deregulation and sweetheart contracts between government and industry. Wealth begets power, and power begets wealth,” he says.

Sachs says four key sectors of US business exemplify this feedback loop and the takeover of political power in America by the ”corporatocracy”.

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