[citation needed]
Buybacks and dividends have, more or less, the same federal tax revenue implications. The difference is that dividends incur a taxable event in a window outside the shareholder’s control.
Beyond that, I’m curious where the idea comes from that the government is giving 0% loans to corporations. Yes, the Fed overnight rate is effectively zero, but you can’t have your cake and eat it too. If I borrow from the overnight window, I have to pay it back the next day. Very hard to do that if I already spent it. Or are we talking about the repo market, where banks can get a longer low-interest loan by putting up security in the form of Treasury bonds?
Both of these facilities are to manage liquidity and don’t provide a 0% loan capability to run-of-the-mill corporations.
.. and to enrich themselves.
This is wildly false.
Look at Germany today; it's an economic powerhouse. You wouldn't believe that this is the same country that it was after WW2 - Germany did not succeed in spite of the post-WW2 economic crisis, it succeeded because of it. Also, it's not the first time Germany recovered in this way either, just look at post-WW1 economic crisis. Germany went from being penniless to become an economic and military superpower in a very short time. It had accumulated so much surplus wealth that its military could almost afford to wipe out the entire planet in WW2.
Financial crashes are an excellent way to clear out inefficiencies and allow the markets to reform themselves and allow meritocracy to regain significance.
Bold claim.
Economic issues after WW1 helped give rise to nationalism and led to WW2. This is why the marshall plan was so important after WW2. Similar countries experienced post-WW2 economic crisis, but few prospered as much as Germany.
To use your reasoning, many countries should be as prosperous as Germany (like, say Argentina - hyperinflation and economic crisis followed by economic restructuring..)
While rebuilding is a very human endeavor, it can take decades or generations. We need to have creative destruction in the economy, we do not need economic depression to do that (other ways to deleverage..)
non-sequitur point. The germany economy was able to be developed to a point where they became a military threat. Nationalism or not, if you just consider economic recovery, it disproves the fact that damage to the economy can ever be permanent. People are going to find ways to live, and in doing so, produce goods and services, and become increasingly efficient.
- Corporations have kept getting bigger and reinforcing their monopolies far beyond the point of optimum efficiency and have been manipulating elections and policy-making to benefit their own interests.
- House prices in big cities have kept going up due to a combination of factors including centralization of capital due to corporate monopoly power.
- Many corporations took free 0% loans from the government to buy back their own shares; often for the purpose of tax evasion. This conduct is unethical in at least 3 different ways when you consider the fact that the Fed is now shamelessly bailing out these corporations to clear that same debt which they used for tax evasion.
- Freedom of speech in the work environment has declined significantly.
- Trust between people has declined to an all time low due to the adverse, coercive work environments in which we operate.
- We are facing huge environmental threats which are not addressed due in a large part to lobbyists backed by corporate interests.
- The financial system is over-complicated and opaque; few people understand how fiat money enters the system but it's clear from empirical evidence that it benefits corporations while harming both small businesses and consumers. Even the Fed itself has admitted that their cash injections do not reach small businesses or the workers.
- Our governments will screw over its citizens in the most blatant way imaginable; they will even exploit a health disaster as an opportunity to fast-track the agendas of their corporate masters.
It's bad enough that most people just stand back idly and nod their heads... But it's deeply disturbing to witness some people go further than that and actually manufacture excuses for what are obviously deeply unethical activities...
Also, it seems that these people who spread misinformation for the sole benefit of corporations are not even getting paid for it! This behavior is not even aligned with the capitalistic self-interest ideals which their corporate thought leaders keep preaching, it's like some weird type of selective masochistic altruism whereby some individuals feel compelled to only help evil people who they know will hurt them along with the rest of society.
If you're a real capitalist, do as you preach and stop defending other richer peoples' interests! That's not how it's supposed to work.
If you're not a billionaire yourself and you oppose the idea of the government making laws which will reduce the wealth of billionaires, you're a socialist for the top 0.0001 percent. A maso-socialist.