Intro to Nationalization

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We are members of a social system that has a number of responsibilities to its “contributing” members

that require funding. The changes to our social structure that will stabilize our lives and bring about mutual satisfaction will have a high price tag. To produce the revenue our nation will need to evolve, the answer is not as simple as making some changes to the corporate tax (welfare) system and seeking more corporate dollars and sponsorship. Many more dollars are going to be needed to build a more perfect present and future living condition for the American citizenry. We must consider nationalizing certain strategically vital industries that are already heavily subsidies by taxpayer dollars. These dollars are used to support the ability of these industries to profit. Each year five months of a working Americans income goes toward funding our social system. Very limited nationalization can directly offset this burden. Perhaps then we could eliminate personal income tax altogether. If need be, personal income tax could be replace with a consumption tax. This would be collecting tax revenue from households as they purchase goods and services.

The governing body of the social system that supports the American collective is the United States government. It must have money to accomplish what we ask of it. At present, most of that money is provided through taxation. The government will need additional sources of funding to aid our citizenry in making improvements to our living conditions. These funds cannot be expected to come from already overburden taxpayers. With the difficulty that already exists for the average Joe and Josette in this competitive free-enterprise system, we must seek to reduce the tax burden on citizens struggling to survive. Most all politicians have acknowledged the fact that America needs reforms in our government’s structure. However, the reforms they propose and enact are not radical enough to effect the changes that are necessary to produce mutual satisfaction for the entire cross section of American society. These changes will keep us just barely ahead of the status quo. Their changes are not indicative of evolution. Our currents systems must evolve to effectively meet the radical changes that have occurred within our society. We the people need changes that balance the needs of the citizenry with the needs of business. First, we must identify our common needs, desires, and our goals as a nation of individuals. We must then look at our current existence and relate those goals to reality in an effort to make our wants realistic. Then, we define the steps, the path, or the general direction of our actions that will lead us to these goals. We then manifest our plan into reality by taking action, or moving in the right or positive direction.

Regarding our government’s participation in the free-enterprise system, each of us must realize that this is all that nationalization is truly. Nationalization is a label that describes the circumstance of bringing industries and/or land under the control or ownership of the nation. This is good for our citizenry because it is “we the people” that own the assets of our nation. When you consider the wealth of our nation, it is still our domestic support programs, i.e. the ones aimed at aiding individual American citizens that are always being reduced or eliminated because of a lack of funding. In addition, corporate cutbacks and layoffs aimed at generating greater company profits are creating hardships for working consumers. Limited, specifically targeted nationalization is a way of providing the funds needed for our domestic support programs. In addition, this resource will provide our government with a way of directly providing employment. This will give our citizenry a stability producing option for those affected by cutbacks and layoffs. Through nationalization, our government will have control over not only another source of revenue, but also a source of employment. It can apply this resource to the task of consistently reducing unemployment. Nationalizing certain vital industries will provide our government with another financial resource. It can be used to lessen the burden of taxation placed upon our general population. It can also aid in providing more support for our collective livelihood and a more perfect existence for our citizenry. The wealth derived from the resources of our nation need to be more equitably distributed to our citizenry because the resources of our nation belong to its citizens. There should be no reason for the individuals of our society to go without the necessities of food, shelter, and clothing, when corporations are reaping huge profits that are the result of the efforts of each productive individual member of our society. Terms like "nationalism" are simply labels that identify the system by which wealth redistribution can occur. Nothing actually changes except the government takes over the operation of key industries and returns those profits to the working class through the internal workings of the social system.

Some people believe that our citizenry will get better services through privatization because of the pressure and leverage that result from competition. They also believe that these same services will be cheaper because of competitive pricing. This thinking led to deregulation within the airline industry. However, instead of producing the 20 or so strong airline companies as expected, four or five major airlines emerged to dominate the market. Ultimately, this theory of cost reduction based upon competition is not without flaw. One of the ways these private sector companies maintain high profits while lowering prices to consumers is by cutting into the wage and benefit packages of its workers. This in turn reduces the standard of living for the individual worker and his or her family. As well, it reduces the income of the community they reside in because of the decrease in the respective family’s ability to spend. Through privatization, all you are truly changing is the administration of the service, and exchanging one set of problems for another. The system under which a business is run can be the same for a government agency if that is how the system is setup. Therefore, rather than penalize the workers through these changes, those who administer the system that should be held accountable. An example would be the notion that municipal workers are lazy and it takes many to do the job of one. The thinking is that if those “lazy” workers were replaced by private industry employees, their efforts and energies would be more fully utilized. Ask yourself, “What is the true difference in this circumstance?” Is the private industry worker naturally more productive? No, it has nothing at all to do with their nature. The administrators in private industry do not allow this sort of thing to happen. If the municipal worker makes more than the same worker does in private industry, why is that? It is because the system allows that to occur. It is then the system itself that needs to be changed.

Let us use the example of snow removal. After a snowfall, taxpayers expect their streets to be cleaned. Is there any citizen that truly wants to have to wake up in the morning and call someone to do this? No, most all of us want it done automatically. Either way, this service must still be paid for by the taxpayer. If it can be shown that a private company can pay their workers less for the same job, this does not mean the taxpayer will save money. In the private sector, every business is setup to make money. Whatever the workers are being paid, the company they work for must still make a profit. Who is to say any savings created by privatizing are going to be passed on to the public? A better solution would be to restructure the pay scale of the municipal worker to reflect that of his or her private industry counterpart. The excess funds that would normally be considered profit are still in the pockets of the taxpayers. Costs could actually drop because the intent of the operating policy is to provide good service and stable employment on a continual basis. As long as the influx of dollars provides the income necessary to meet these objectives adequately, the operation is successful. The cost of services affect would be structured around this principle. This is a true savings. We need to restructure government by making it more efficient and responsible to our citizenry. We do not need to allow corporations to control our lives. We need to make changes to our social system and how it is administered, not change who profits from it.

The U.S. Postal Service was once a profitable business under the operation of the United States government that employed over 700,000 individuals before email, Federal Express, and UPS. In an article from the Associated Press in May of 1998, it was reported that the independent Postal Rate commission said that the U.S. Postal Service had been making profits of over $1 billion a year since 1995. The Postal Service is a nationalized business. It has not discouraged or eliminated competition in this industry, nor has its existence led to communism, dictatorship, or tyranny. Our social system must evolve to support our individual evolution. Within the context of this effort, we need to nationalize certain vital industries to provide the revenue that our government says it does not have. The industries to nationalize are vital to the success of our society, and they are businesses with national markets and networks. It makes sense to nationalize them because they must always exist. The need for their continued existence is the founding philosophy behind our federal subsidy programs. Most of the industries that should be nationalized are already heavily subsidies by our tax dollars. Our system of government is involved up to its proverbial ears in the free-enterprise system. To say that our government should stay out of the areas of ownership and control is not truly practical when one faces the fact that we rely on our government to provide funds to localities for this and that, and to subsidies the ability of businesses to profit. What we need to do is provide our government with another source of revenue so that it can adequately provide services for us, while aiding it in the production and maintenance of balanced federal budgets. With limited nationalization, a streamlining of government and better financial management, we the people (working together) can meet the challenges the future has in store for us.

There are those in our society that believe it is in the best interest of our social system to make our government smaller. Government provides the structure of a social system and it is where the interests of the people are represented in an organized manner. Government is the structured system through which the people derive and maintain mutual benefit and protection. Corporations represent the interests of individuals or small groups who act in their own best interests. They are primarily concerned with their own profit and gain. By making our government smaller, the representation of we the people is made smaller. This concentrates the control of both resources and livelihoods within the hands of the individuals inside these corporations, which use their profits to influence those in positions of administration. We should not be afraid of large government because it is merely a conception created by the label we give it. To one degree or another, we should actually pursue a larger government. This is because we want and expect our government to provide as many of the necessary services that we need free of charge, so that we do not have to spend our limited financial resources for those things. This in turn frees some of our limited finances, which can then be spent on things more to our liking and desire. This will elevate our standard of living.

LIMITED NATIONALIZATION

TO FUND OUR SYSTEM OF LIVING

copyrighted 2002

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