27 Comments

Every GM worker from manufacturing to managerial should demand a town hall to ask Ms Barra exactly how BBB hurts them and their families. Don't stop asking questions until she's spelled it out and taken questions that counter the position. The same should go for every company who's leadership participates in the BR and companies are supporting the propaganda. Oh and the btw, didn't taxpayers dollars bail out GM just a decade ago?

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That…that is a photo op…it is disheartening, to put it mildly, and I’m glad you covered it the way you did.

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So, Mary Barra says that raising corporate taxes would stifle innovation and investment in their workers? Horse-hockey! When the top tax rate (in the 50's) was 90% there was a kind of forced investment in their businesses and their workers and the only way to lessen that number WAS TO ACTUALLY INVEST IN YOUR BUSINESS AND INCREASE PAY AND BENEFITS FOR YOUR LABOR FORCE.

I say we need to return to a semblance of the tax rate and it doesn't even have to be close to 90% but could be effective at a much lower rate (I'm not an economist so I'll leave the amount up to them).

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I’d be thrilled to go back to the tax policies of the late 60s, both corp and personal.

We should also make stock buybacks illegal too. Talk about the opposite of investing in the company….

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Are we ever going to get to a time and place where publicly elected officials do the job they were elected to do without being owned by dark money and corporations? Everyone has a hidden agenda and nobody is honest anymore. Now the right wing is actively supporting Russia? This never ends...

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Remember, written into law now, is execs' LEGAL REQUIREMENT to maximise shareholder return on investment, which means they are LEGALLY bound to increase profits any way they can. This is the design of the super-rich, who don't give two shits about America or Democracy.

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It’s time to change the legal requirement so companies have some legal obligation to workers and the larger society.

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Please watch Abigail Disney’s new, excellent documentary on corporate power/wage gap/us economic history, “The American dream and other fairy tales,” which premiered this week at Sundance. —If it wins a prize, the public will have another chance at a single “ticket” this Friday afternoon (check Sundance website); otherwise hopefully someone will pick it up for “theatrical” [probably streaming] release. beautifully covers corporate tax policy & limits on power of unions to change worker cOnditions.

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I wonder how that’s defined, because it only ever seems to make sense from one quarter to the next, with a dim long term view as companies slash costs that feed directly back into decreased consumer purchasing power and stability. It’s never about a rising tide lifting all boats, but rather how to get blood from a stone, over and over again.

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This increased massively in the 1990s with huge layoffs

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Very little criticism from the CEOs on the substance of the BBB programs. Most of it are objections to paying higher taxes. So what else is new? Do they ever object to the 760B slotted for the waste riddled defense budget? Guns or butter, folks. It is our choice.

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i don't think that the meeting/photo op are problematic in view of there being a free press that vigorously covers inconsistent statements by corporate CEOs - beginning but not ending with PopInfo. Biden wasn’t just lending a bully pulpit to BusRoundtable but was interrogating ms Barra and others, doing the press’s work for them, in public. A far cry from TFG’s pandering and even (to quote Leonard Cohen, may he rest in power) creating a crack through which “the light gets in.”

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Oh PS yesterday I watched Abigail Disney’s new, excellent documentary on corporate power/wage gap/us economic history, “The American dream and other fairy tales,” premiering online at Sundance. If it wins a prize, the public will have another chance at a single “ticket” this Friday afternoon (check Sundance website); otherwise hopefully someone will pick it up for “theatrical” [probably streaming] release. Don’t miss!

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I have questions, where is the math? Where is the proof? Is the Roundtable just making shit up and saying it is bad for workers? How is it bad for workers? Are the workers believing the ads?

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I think “bad for workers” is just the excuse. Besides the HR dept, no company has a policy unit focused on workers - aside from worker productivity. The only decision is what’s good for the stockholders (specifically the execs and major holders).

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There are always people who believe the ads.

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I did a very quick Google search and it doesn’t appear this meeting generated national media coverage, though a lot of locals seem to have covered due to a Nexstar release (that I didn’t read). The meeting doesn’t seem wrong to me. I think he’s meeting with this group because he knows they are influencers and roadblocks. Now that BBB likely will break into three pieces, he needed to hear what each would support based on where they stand today. The picture is a photo op that can be used to remind everyone who was there and hopefully journalists will have success in following up and getting Barra and others on record with more info about their stances. Like it or loathe it, politics is tricky business and from where I sit, Biden has to turn over every stone in his quest to move the legislation forward.

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Excellent coverage of the hypocrisy.

What if the SEC required public companies to report on their funding to groups who support or oppose the business risks they report? Would that help remove the two-faced game these companies play where they publicly praise legislation while privately funding attack dogs?

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the law requiring corporations to maximize return to investors: how many consumers know about that one? what would be their response. At 95, I have ample time to pursue the media, both mainstream and alternate, and most days I learn something I didn't know! !!!! L&B&L

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Ida, I sure didn’t know about that law (and still wonder what it is - federal statute? SEC regulation that would only apply to publicly traded corporations? State law in writers home state?) I hope I’m around and as vital as you sound in 25 years!!

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Popular Info needs a White House correspondent. Great hit on Stand up with Pete btw Judd!

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Thank you! Excellent piece!

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As I've learned about the world, I've learned that the wealth gap is quite intentional. Keeping oligarchs rich (and eligible for the Forbes top wealthiest list each year) and powerful is the goal. It depends on cheap labor. It depends on keeping people so poor and tired and undereducated that they have no way to "rise up" and demand and expect more. Oligarchs like the ones who joined the White House meeting last week know full well that child tax credits come out of the pockets of the radically overpaid upper managers of it all. There has never been any need to have prices go up if workers are paid better, and the systems work better and everyone flourishes when everyone shares in the results of a comfortable middle class. But, that wealth space between being rich and being an oligarch will take a hit. That really is the essence of all of this. So Biden is barking up the wrong tree when he hopes to appeal to the humanity and kindness of these CEOs. People who become CEOs of major corporations would not have risen to the top if they showed any signs of wanting to give it away to their workers or anyone else.

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Judd I’ve subscribed to popular info for several years & I love it. I’m here to ask if you’ve ever considered other platforms. It’s been brought up that Substack has been hosting several anti-vaxx people & I feel they are destructive, dangerous & have indirectly or directly caused the deaths of hundreds if not thousands of people. Please consider moving Popular Info to an alternate platform. Thank you

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Ask Mary Barra if GM is on the leading front on EV production. I don't think they are - we are lagging Europe and especially Asia in both production and automobile technology. Where are GM's investments going? Why support BBB when GM is not driving investment into the US? Why ask the US taxpayer to foot a bill that will not benefit the US GM employee base? Biden knows the story - he is trying to get corporate support for the USA, not just increasing corporate profits. A tax credit for EV vehicles will help GM sell products made in another country. It would not be my first choice to really help America.

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My thoughts: No, it is not a smart strategy. When November comes around and voters realize Democrats haven't delivered despite controlling the presidency and Congress, all of this concern for optics won't mean much.

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If the Biden presidency has an Achilles heel, it’s inflation - not pandering to corporate chieftains (as your comment implies). And I refuse to join the naysayers pre-midterms. Ain’t over til it’s over.

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