Wednesday, February 27, 2013

If corporations are legally recognized as "legal fictions" and if they are to be protected by the Constitution, why not also enlarge the sphere of their duties. Of course, a corporation is an economic entity not a political entity. But, its an 'invented ' economic entity that only "exists in contemplation of law". Unlike a real human being who functions in both the economy and the polity, and who has economic duties and Constitutional duties in the polity, a corporation was fictionally created primarilly to increase its economic 'grasp'. It was given Constitutional protection, but it seems they forgot to give it Constitutional duties. Instead of extending their fictional nature and attributing speech to them, which is ridiculous, why not give it a few Constitutional duties. Of course, fictional "persons" cannot serve in the military, although they do help to manufacture and produce weapons. And of course, corporations can and do pay taxes. It used to be they had a 90% liability. Why was it originally 90% and why is it now 35%? Could it be that when it was 90%, 'someone' really understood that since their corporate nature tremendously increases their economic 'grasp' and economic activity, they should pay a 'fair' share of their newly acquired economic powers. So, why was their tax liability reduced? No human being, regardless how wealthy s/he might be, can compete with the corporate structure. As a matter of fact, the 1% use the 'structure' to increase their personal fortunes. Besides increasing the corporate tax obligation, how about requiring some contribution to the work force relative to 'fair wages' and/or the availability of 'jobs'. Why shouldn't 'out-sourcing' be outlawed? Of course, unless it meets a primary requirement of having made every effort to keep the activity within the confines of the Nation and only secondarily, it can go to other Nations, so long as some Constitutional duty is not being avoided. Surely some guidelines along these 'economic and legal paths' are possible. If we can create economic fictions, we can create Constitutional obligations commensurate with their fictional nature. They're not human, they cannot 'hurt'. The only people who 'hurt' are the real people 'behind' the corporate structure who are pocketing the money made by the entity. And generally, those people are the 1%. Real persons at the bottom of a triadic government are not benefiting from corporate activity and the 'fictional' person is laughing all the way to the bank.

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Democracy For The Bottom by Gilbert Gonzalez is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.