The Battle of Long Island in the US Revolutionary War. (Image: Wikimedia Commons)
Independence Day and the Imperial CEO
In 2021, opposition to freedom comes not from a foreign king and his aristocratic courtiers but from our own domestic elites—the uber-rich of the New Gilded Era.
On July 4, 1776, Americans rejected the divine right of kings, declaring self-evident truths: All men are created equal. Legitimate government is founded on consent of the governed. Government exists to support our pursuit of life, liberty and happiness--not to save our souls or pursue military glory. Now, those principles of limited government can tame imperial CEOs.
In 2021, opposition to freedom comes not from a foreign king and his aristocratic courtiers but from our own domestic elites--the uber-rich of the New Gilded Era and the multi-national corporations that dominate our economy. The new "malefactors of great wealth" (as Teddy Roosevelt called their predecessors) seduce politicians and regulators with the promise of lucrative jobs, and terrorize them with threats of negative campaign ads.
The result is crippling. Neither democracy nor markets can work if economic incumbents can transform their wealth into rules that guarantee them still more wealth.
Since 1980, median and minimum wages have lagged far behind productivity growth, even as growth slowed disappointingly. Simultaneously, corporate executives pay themselves dynastic sums--the average CEO of a publicly-traded company now takes home millions of dollars annually, 274 times median employee pay. The CEO of Palantir was paid over $1 billion during the pandemic--not bad for government work (half of Palantir's revenue).
At this pay, imperial executives live in a different world. And it shows in the corporations they run. Instead of focusing on good jobs for Americans, useful products and services or the common welfare, our firms treat us as mere tools to their pursuit of profit--as if they were colonial occupiers and we their subjects. Seeking to extract as much as possible from employees and consumers alike, they campaign to keep wages low while dodging responsibility for pollution, safety or taxes. Lord Acton said that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Beyond corruption, unchecked power generates unchecked incompetence: leaders surrounded by sycophants or purchased loyalists mismanage our institutions. We should be able--like every other rich country--to provide medical care to those who need it, not just fatten the wallets of big pharma, insurers, and hospital executives. Self-rule depends on an informed populace, not disinformation from oil, tobacco, or finance companies protecting dangerous products, conspiracy mongering by clicks-for-profit algorithms, or politicians corrupted by the carrots and sticks of enormously wealthy institutions.
We created corporations, like governments, to help in our pursuit of life, liberty and happiness. Yet they've escaped our control. In effect, we've let our creations rule us. But we need not remain enthralled to these modern idols.
The first step towards a more decent society is to extend the lessons of the Enlightenment's liberal revolutions. They abolished the divine right of kings and the notion that government officials owned their offices. Now we need to defeat pretenses that executives are the corporations they run or that corporate profit is sacrosanct.
To start, we must clarify that the U.S. Constitution grants rights to people, not organizations. In Citizens United, the Supreme Court held--contrary to text and logic--that the Constitution requires allowing executives to use corporate money to influence elections. That is taxation without representation, not free speech. When we buy products or work for corporations, we entrust our money to corporate leaders for limited purposes--not to corrupt our politics or economy. The same is true of other rights the Court has invented for corporations: rights for firms generally disempower citizens.
Corporate power is our power, not the CEO's. No free people could allow its governmental officials to rule without popular elections, to make all decisions behind closed doors, to disregard countervailing popular sentiment, or to force subordinates to follow the officials' religion.
Corporations are created by ordinary statutes, not constitutions. Ordinary law should also direct, restrain, and reform them. If the Court won't allow this, we should amend the Constitution, as suggested by groups like Move to Amend, to reclaim the power of Congress and state legislatures to set corporate rights and responsibilities. Or, states should demand businesses waive the Court's invented rights as the price of corporate privilege.
Then, we need to extend the rest of the democratic-republican revolution to our giant corporations. Twitter and Facebook are too important for their executives to have unchecked power to decide whom to allow or exclude on their platforms. CEOs should be servants, not masters; employees and customers should be citizens, not subjects; free debate, open meetings, and job security should be the rule, not the exception.
Urgent. It's never been this bad.
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission from the outset was simple. To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It’s never been this bad out there. And it’s never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed and doing some of its best and most important work, the threats we face are intensifying. Right now, with just four days to go in our Spring Campaign, we are not even halfway to our goal. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Can you make a gift right now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? There is no backup plan or rainy day fund. There is only you. —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
On July 4, 1776, Americans rejected the divine right of kings, declaring self-evident truths: All men are created equal. Legitimate government is founded on consent of the governed. Government exists to support our pursuit of life, liberty and happiness--not to save our souls or pursue military glory. Now, those principles of limited government can tame imperial CEOs.
In 2021, opposition to freedom comes not from a foreign king and his aristocratic courtiers but from our own domestic elites--the uber-rich of the New Gilded Era and the multi-national corporations that dominate our economy. The new "malefactors of great wealth" (as Teddy Roosevelt called their predecessors) seduce politicians and regulators with the promise of lucrative jobs, and terrorize them with threats of negative campaign ads.
The result is crippling. Neither democracy nor markets can work if economic incumbents can transform their wealth into rules that guarantee them still more wealth.
Since 1980, median and minimum wages have lagged far behind productivity growth, even as growth slowed disappointingly. Simultaneously, corporate executives pay themselves dynastic sums--the average CEO of a publicly-traded company now takes home millions of dollars annually, 274 times median employee pay. The CEO of Palantir was paid over $1 billion during the pandemic--not bad for government work (half of Palantir's revenue).
At this pay, imperial executives live in a different world. And it shows in the corporations they run. Instead of focusing on good jobs for Americans, useful products and services or the common welfare, our firms treat us as mere tools to their pursuit of profit--as if they were colonial occupiers and we their subjects. Seeking to extract as much as possible from employees and consumers alike, they campaign to keep wages low while dodging responsibility for pollution, safety or taxes. Lord Acton said that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Beyond corruption, unchecked power generates unchecked incompetence: leaders surrounded by sycophants or purchased loyalists mismanage our institutions. We should be able--like every other rich country--to provide medical care to those who need it, not just fatten the wallets of big pharma, insurers, and hospital executives. Self-rule depends on an informed populace, not disinformation from oil, tobacco, or finance companies protecting dangerous products, conspiracy mongering by clicks-for-profit algorithms, or politicians corrupted by the carrots and sticks of enormously wealthy institutions.
We created corporations, like governments, to help in our pursuit of life, liberty and happiness. Yet they've escaped our control. In effect, we've let our creations rule us. But we need not remain enthralled to these modern idols.
The first step towards a more decent society is to extend the lessons of the Enlightenment's liberal revolutions. They abolished the divine right of kings and the notion that government officials owned their offices. Now we need to defeat pretenses that executives are the corporations they run or that corporate profit is sacrosanct.
To start, we must clarify that the U.S. Constitution grants rights to people, not organizations. In Citizens United, the Supreme Court held--contrary to text and logic--that the Constitution requires allowing executives to use corporate money to influence elections. That is taxation without representation, not free speech. When we buy products or work for corporations, we entrust our money to corporate leaders for limited purposes--not to corrupt our politics or economy. The same is true of other rights the Court has invented for corporations: rights for firms generally disempower citizens.
Corporate power is our power, not the CEO's. No free people could allow its governmental officials to rule without popular elections, to make all decisions behind closed doors, to disregard countervailing popular sentiment, or to force subordinates to follow the officials' religion.
Corporations are created by ordinary statutes, not constitutions. Ordinary law should also direct, restrain, and reform them. If the Court won't allow this, we should amend the Constitution, as suggested by groups like Move to Amend, to reclaim the power of Congress and state legislatures to set corporate rights and responsibilities. Or, states should demand businesses waive the Court's invented rights as the price of corporate privilege.
Then, we need to extend the rest of the democratic-republican revolution to our giant corporations. Twitter and Facebook are too important for their executives to have unchecked power to decide whom to allow or exclude on their platforms. CEOs should be servants, not masters; employees and customers should be citizens, not subjects; free debate, open meetings, and job security should be the rule, not the exception.
On July 4, 1776, Americans rejected the divine right of kings, declaring self-evident truths: All men are created equal. Legitimate government is founded on consent of the governed. Government exists to support our pursuit of life, liberty and happiness--not to save our souls or pursue military glory. Now, those principles of limited government can tame imperial CEOs.
In 2021, opposition to freedom comes not from a foreign king and his aristocratic courtiers but from our own domestic elites--the uber-rich of the New Gilded Era and the multi-national corporations that dominate our economy. The new "malefactors of great wealth" (as Teddy Roosevelt called their predecessors) seduce politicians and regulators with the promise of lucrative jobs, and terrorize them with threats of negative campaign ads.
The result is crippling. Neither democracy nor markets can work if economic incumbents can transform their wealth into rules that guarantee them still more wealth.
Since 1980, median and minimum wages have lagged far behind productivity growth, even as growth slowed disappointingly. Simultaneously, corporate executives pay themselves dynastic sums--the average CEO of a publicly-traded company now takes home millions of dollars annually, 274 times median employee pay. The CEO of Palantir was paid over $1 billion during the pandemic--not bad for government work (half of Palantir's revenue).
At this pay, imperial executives live in a different world. And it shows in the corporations they run. Instead of focusing on good jobs for Americans, useful products and services or the common welfare, our firms treat us as mere tools to their pursuit of profit--as if they were colonial occupiers and we their subjects. Seeking to extract as much as possible from employees and consumers alike, they campaign to keep wages low while dodging responsibility for pollution, safety or taxes. Lord Acton said that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Beyond corruption, unchecked power generates unchecked incompetence: leaders surrounded by sycophants or purchased loyalists mismanage our institutions. We should be able--like every other rich country--to provide medical care to those who need it, not just fatten the wallets of big pharma, insurers, and hospital executives. Self-rule depends on an informed populace, not disinformation from oil, tobacco, or finance companies protecting dangerous products, conspiracy mongering by clicks-for-profit algorithms, or politicians corrupted by the carrots and sticks of enormously wealthy institutions.
We created corporations, like governments, to help in our pursuit of life, liberty and happiness. Yet they've escaped our control. In effect, we've let our creations rule us. But we need not remain enthralled to these modern idols.
The first step towards a more decent society is to extend the lessons of the Enlightenment's liberal revolutions. They abolished the divine right of kings and the notion that government officials owned their offices. Now we need to defeat pretenses that executives are the corporations they run or that corporate profit is sacrosanct.
To start, we must clarify that the U.S. Constitution grants rights to people, not organizations. In Citizens United, the Supreme Court held--contrary to text and logic--that the Constitution requires allowing executives to use corporate money to influence elections. That is taxation without representation, not free speech. When we buy products or work for corporations, we entrust our money to corporate leaders for limited purposes--not to corrupt our politics or economy. The same is true of other rights the Court has invented for corporations: rights for firms generally disempower citizens.
Corporate power is our power, not the CEO's. No free people could allow its governmental officials to rule without popular elections, to make all decisions behind closed doors, to disregard countervailing popular sentiment, or to force subordinates to follow the officials' religion.
Corporations are created by ordinary statutes, not constitutions. Ordinary law should also direct, restrain, and reform them. If the Court won't allow this, we should amend the Constitution, as suggested by groups like Move to Amend, to reclaim the power of Congress and state legislatures to set corporate rights and responsibilities. Or, states should demand businesses waive the Court's invented rights as the price of corporate privilege.
Then, we need to extend the rest of the democratic-republican revolution to our giant corporations. Twitter and Facebook are too important for their executives to have unchecked power to decide whom to allow or exclude on their platforms. CEOs should be servants, not masters; employees and customers should be citizens, not subjects; free debate, open meetings, and job security should be the rule, not the exception.