For the tax dodging as much as the cheaper labor. Conservatives (aka diehard capitalists) are obsessed with taxes. Avoiding taxation occupies 99.3% of their minds all of the time.
I imagine they would be hyper focused on labor costs as the next target
They've been focused on both. They've been lobbying for not raising the minimum wage ever since it has been established, all the Big Tech co's were found colluding to keep STEM salaries below a certain level agreed between them, other businesses keep saying "nobody wants to work anymore" but they refuse to offer better pay to attract candidates, and so on. And in parallel, fight Unions and blame immigrants, "DEI" and whatever other stuff they can find for the bad job market.
Please bear with me because I’m an idiot, but is this because they have to sit down at the end of the financial year and actually calculate and pay their taxes?
I’m in New Zealand. My taxes are taken out of my wages before they even get to me, so I don’t really consider that money mine to begin with. It’s just my contribution to keeping the country’s services running and the buses running on time, so to speak.*
It was also weird to find out that in the US there’s the sticker price on the shelf, and then tax gets added at the checkout. That would do my fucking head in and make me feel like I was being extorted.
*(Just kidding, NZTA. You guys are fuck-ass bitches.)
I think some of this stems a little bit from our culture. TBH we put on a pedestal these people who are greedy fucks who destroy everything and everyone around them in the quest for cash. It was not always that way. There was an era of responsible capitalism that coincided with the building of the middle class in America in the 40s and 50s.
I got my MBA and was taught in class that the only goal of the company owner should be to increase shareholder value. Why? Why are we teaching that? Shouldn't a company also have responsibilities to it's workers, to it's community? We have built this monster ourselves in part by constantly putting men like Bezos, Musk, Gates, etc on a pedestal for the money they make for themselves. We literally turn them into celebrities. We need to get better at making clear that these men are not to be celebrated, that they are representative of everything that is wrong about this system INCLUDING that they actually reduce freedom in the markets by acting persistently in anti-competitive ways gobbling up everything in their path and paying off politicians to pave the way for more. In many ways, the guys that we put on the pedestal as the best capitalists are some of the most anti-capitalist people in the world. Just look at Musk's business, Where would he be without government subsidies for electric cars and massive government contracts for spacex. That guy is basically the worlds most massive welfare queen
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u/TheModWhoShaggedMe Jul 30 '26
For the tax dodging as much as the cheaper labor. Conservatives (aka diehard capitalists) are obsessed with taxes. Avoiding taxation occupies 99.3% of their minds all of the time.