VULTURE Capitalism, Illustrated

The image is from Michael's Journal; the excerpt below is from Norman Livergood. The brackets and links are mine (except Argentina), but I recommend visiting his site for the rest of the article and more great links.

In essence, [vulture] capitalism is "generalised commodity production," the transforming of all life into a "thing," something to be owned or traded. [with the most important commodity being money]

Vulture capitalists call this commoditization of human life the "free-market-system" and force it on nations throughout the world.

When this "system" fails, the vulture capitalists send in their carefully-selected Harvard economists to see that the nation's financial ruin is complete.

In 2001, Argentina was the last in a long list of nations which have fallen prey to the ravages of vulture capitalism: currency-manipulation, asset-stripping, and factories and products sold at pennies on the dollar.

[But,] there are important distinctions between the various types of capitalism:

1. Industrial capitalism: producing profit through [productive] manufacturing and distribution
2. Finance capitalism: producing profit through the manipulation of financial instruments (bonds, stocks, securities, derivatives, etc.)

Vulture capitalism is a form of finance capitalism, a hydra-headed monster:

• Multinational corporations moving their manufacturing plants to wherever the labor market is cheapest, where they can get the largest tax break from the host country, and where they can be assured that the host country will adopt a currency that can be traded without danger of political interference. [emphasis added]


• The Wall Street-Treasury Complex during the 1990s allowing its economic client-states (Japan, South Korea, Thailand, South Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, the Philippines, Taiwan, and others as occasion dictates) to make profits by selling their goods on the American market . [that's where we get all our appliances, electronics, and automobiles from; financiers let American industry rot and pour our MONEY elsewhere.]


• Vulture capitalists selling U.S. client-states military weaponry manufactured by their own corporations and peddled through the Pentagon and U.S. embassies world-wide [Haliburton, Lockheed, et al]


• the Wall Street-Treasury Complex forcing its client-states to open their economies so U.S. vulture capitalists can carve out huge profits through currency manipulation and asset-stripping


• the vulture capitalists buying assets (manufacturing plants, banks, businesses, etc.) at pennies on the dollar, when the client-state begins to go under, because the American market is saturated


• the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank--fronts for the Wall Street-Treasury Complex--offering loans to nations with ailing economies, forcing them to implement draconian economic measures (euphemistically called "conditionalities"):

1. laying off as many workers as possible
2. cutting wages at all levels
3. forcing the nation to pay its debts to IMF and the World Bank before making any other payments

• vulture capitalists attacking the currencies of nations with ailing economies (e.g. Indonesia, Russia) and reaping obscene profits

"For globalization to work, America can't be afraid to act like the almighty superpower that it is. The hidden hand of the market will never work without a hidden fist.

McDonald's cannot flourish without McDonald-Douglas, the designer of the F-15, and the hidden fist that keeps the world safe for Silicon Valley's technology is called the United States Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps."

Thomas Friedman, New York Times, March 28, 1999

Friedman is a leading mouthpiece for U.S. imperialism. This editorial appeared four days after the start of the 1999 bombing war against Yugoslavia.

Throughout the world, workers are being systematically beaten down by vulture capitalism:

1. unequal taxes (huckstered as "tax cuts")
2. "rent-a-judge" justice systems
3. sky-rocketing unemployment
4. rising prices
5. sold-to-the-highest-bidder-congresspersons
6. corporations such as Enron left to their own dog-eat-dog profit-making tactics which receive U.S. tax monies when they make bad foreign investments

I recommend reading the outside link on Argentina, top to bottom; very informative. When you're done, please, let's put a stop to this; help spread the word.