Corporate Innovation

One of the Facebook characters stated that Corporations are the source of all innovation and job creation.

After I finished choking I tried to explain succinctly and politely that corporations are responsible for stifling innovation and shipping jobs over seas where they don't have to pay workers a living wage.

The sad part was the joker attacked the president and then declined further discussion under the label of inappropriate venue.

Well this is an appropriate venue and I offer up my thoughts with the understanding anyone may respond as long as they are polite. Facts will be checked and bullshit called.

My particular point is that corporations were created to hide owners and concentrate wealth. They were not created, nor do they, innovate or create jobs. Most corporations consolidate actual production jobs (production as opposed to overhead or non-production labor) to minimize their direct costs. Overhead can be amortized over quantity but direct costs accrue proportionately with production, because they add value (ie create wealth).

Here are real facts on innovation.

Nikola Tesla, an immigrant from Serbia, invented the modern electrical distribution system, fluorescent lights and radio. These are true facts. Look up the patents. He was paid 25,000 by Westinghouse for the patents on the generators, transformers, switches, and distribution system he designed and then he built the first generation plant at Niagara Falls.

George Westinghouse provided cash. And made BILLIONS. Without Nikola Tesla's genius we'd have no power grid, no aluminum manufacturing operations, no airlines, spaceflight, and pretty much anything that requires large quantities of electrical energy. (Semi conductors....) And we might have more air pollution because of inefficient coal usage.

One example.

PCs are another. IBM had no interest in small computers until Apple founders Jobs and Wozniak started selling computers to persons. Then they decided to peddle to their corporate market. IBM and Microsoft, as corporate partners, stifled the growth of the personal computer for years. Windows was/is a poor copy of Apple's OS. Innovation stifled. Oh and Apple as a corporation doesn't want anyone to play with their toys... another stifler.

So where are the examples of corporate innovation? Well when I worked for Scott Fetzer in the early 80's we manufactured electric motors in Watertown NY. The workers in the factory were mostly women (because they worked for less) and the management wanted to cut direct costs so they opened a plant in Mexico where instead of $8 an hour they paid the workers $8 a day. Instead of using high end manufacturing techniques and training the workforce to operate robotic equipment they just found people they could hire for less money to do things the old way.

Innovation.

Those are the facts. Corporations don't want to create wealth for individuals. They want to create wealth for themselves, with no moral compunctions otherwise. Corporations need to be regulated and tightly controlled because they have no human values. They only consider profit and that doesn't support human society. We saw how they manipulated the economy when no one was watching them. They bled the economy until it nearly collapsed.

I could go on but I really am tired. It would be nice if we the people, conservative and otherwise, could have a civilized and intelligent discussion. We might find that the real villains are the ones trying to tell us what a good job they're doing fixing the mess they made.