It is obvious isn’t it? We don’t need competition we need cooperation.
People work better in teams with a common aim. We don’t need them arbitrarily divided into profit-making groups. We want national services that are fairly priced and not geared to generate profit for rich people but to provide services for us.
All this drive to privatisation and competition is doing is putting money in the pockets of the rich.
We privatise universities and schools and suddenly the Vice Chancellors and SuperHeads are on vast salaries.
We privatise healthcare and the costs go through the roof as profits are creamed off.
We privatise the railways and fares go through the roof as profits are creamed off.
We privatise energy and the coasts soar.
We privatise the Post Office and the cost of a stamp goes through the ceiling.
We privatise water and our bills shoot up.
When will we learn? Competition has not driven down costs or improved services. It just means that money is being siphoned off into the pockets of the rich – the bosses, now paid astronomical sums, and the shareholders.
It is time to nationalise, cooperate, stop paying ridiculous sums to the people in charge and put those profits back into reducing bills and better services.
It may well be time, my friend, but how do we wrest the power back from the uber-rich, who seem never to have enough to satisfy their desire or their greed. Midases, all?
xx,
mgh
Well in England we have the possibility to vote for Corbyn in the next election and that would be a big step in the right direction. He will nationalise spome of those industries and put a stop to the creeping privatisation of education and the NHS.
“Privatisation” – a euphemism for pandering to corporate interests and funneling revenue into lining the pockets of the “entitled.”
Those of us who care about the health and welfare of the majority truly must learn to play the game of words that those with wealthy minority interests has been using to lull people to sleep.
The GOP has been doing it for years here in the USA, and the Dems don’t seem to have figured out that the co opting of terms needs to be countered every. single. time. or words will be defined however suits the despots who wage war in that manner: “peacekeeping missile, right to life, school choice, alternate facts” just to name a few.
xx,
mgh
I don’t see this use of language as a left vs. right thing. Even the term “health care” is a construction; it’s really “medical care”. i.e. health care is an individual choice…therefore, not a natural right. But, even if an individual choose a a healthy life, at some point they may need medical care. All of this has implications such as; do we as a society deny medical care to those who made unhealthy choices?
So, we end up faced with taking a moral stand as a society. The complication is that the real power structure is in the hands of an unethical group of corporations backed by the elite…”big pharma” etc.
Jack – that is right. I haven’t thought of ‘health Care’ in that way. I think the people with the clout call the shots on most things.
‘The Entitled’ sums it up for me Madelyn. They think they are entitled; they think they deserve to be given a bigger slice, they deserve it. It reminds me of that obnoxious advert -‘because you’re worth it!’. The truth is that being wealthy and privileged does not make them any more worth it than anybody else. They are merely greedy and selfish and have enough clout to buy off politicians either overtly or through lobbying.
They spout a litany of Orwellian oxymorons.
“Competition is a sin.” – John D. Rockefeller
I’m surprised Rockefeller agrees with me Jack.
A guiding principle of the robber barons. One that led to the practice of using legislation and regulation to the advantage of the wealthy power elite. For instance, the breakup of Standard Oil made Rockefeller much more wealthy.
In the present, regulations, zoning, code etc. put the advantage squarely in the hands of the huge corporation and serve to quell competition.
Saying one thing and doing the opposite is a general tactic. Seems to work for the Tories.
Explain more Jack – how does that work?
It’s not much different from Orwell’s “New Speak”. An example would be the phrase “sustainable development” which emanated from the likes of Rothschild henchman, Marice Strong, David Rockefeller and Zbigniew Brzezinski. You have to ask yourself, “why would these guys with obvious ties to fossil fuel industries be interested in sustainable resources?” The answer is, of course, more control. The power elite uses the guise of environmentalism, in concert with government power, to limit land and resource access and use (through regulation, eminent domain, zoning, and things like the Federal government taking control of 1.3 million acres in Utah).
In every one of your privatization examples, there isn’t actual competition. There may be one or two huge companies or, divisions thereof, that have the ability to come to the table and run any such enterprise.
So, you go from taxpayer subsidized monopoly to private monopoly funded by the same citizens through pricing and almost always, government subsidies.
Governments work for the power elite, big business, oligarchs…whatever name you want to apply to them; not the other way around.
That is fascinating Jack. Thank you for that. Very illuminating.
Reblogged this on 61chrissterry and commented:
Whatever we do in the UK is a fudge.
Take privatisation, supposedly to introduce competition but how can there be competition when there is only one operator.
Then re-nationalisation supposedly for profits to be reinvested, but are they reinvested or are they creamed off by the Government of the day.
Pre-privatisation many of the nationalised industries were deprived of much need investment and investment was used on a political basis.
Theoretically nationalisation should be good for the majority, but if it is not applied effectively on a practical basis it will not be good for the majority.
Here is an example of how a word or term can get bastardized: Science Daily defines a classic liberal thusly;
“Classical liberalism is a political philosophy and ideology belonging to liberalism in which primary emphasis is placed on securing the freedom of the individual by limiting the power of the government.”
https://www.sciencedaily.com/terms/classical_liberalism.htm
The Mises Institute defines it in this way:
“”Classical liberalism” is the term used to designate the ideology advocating private property, an unhampered market economy, the rule of law, constitutional guarantees of freedom of religion and of the press, and international peace based on free trade.”
https://mises.org/library/what-classical-liberalism
I bring this up because, I consider myself a “liberal” in the manner that was originally defined.
That said, what the State is obligated to pay for, or not, rests on what a given group of individuals decides so. My strong conviction is that this can only be achieved through decentralization (i.e. “smaller is better”} rather than Globalism via the Central Banking Cartel, World Bank or the IMF.
All that said Opher, I will say that my experience with your responses to my comments has been that you are a true gentleman. And, in the spirit of this blog I offer up one of my favorite protest songs: “Call It Democracy” by Bruce Cockburn:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68zccrskOqQ
I’m not in the habit of putting links in a blog comment, my apologies if that is a problem.
I don’t mind links at all. I haven’t heard this track at all. Difficult to hear the lyrics first time through. I’ll give it a few listens.
I think I most probably want the opposite of what you want. I want the State to provide excellent quality services and a progressive taxation system to reduce inequality.
You have inspired me to lay out my thinking in a post so all can have a pop at it!
Some degree of self-interest is probably normal. The problem is more that there are a few who are Super-Hyper REALLY Ultra Greedy Swine. (SHRUGS) They prey on the cooperation that most people naturally feel and use that to gain trust. Then, they steal more. Anyway, greater detail and suggestions for shrugging off the shrugs. https://petersironwood.wordpress.com/2017/12/16/peace-love-3-shrugging-off-the-shrugs/
Cheers Peter. I’ll check it out.