Is IBM loyal to America?

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

In World War II, IBM not only collaborated with the Nazis, but they even used "intellectual property" laws to keep technology out of the hands of the United States military, but shared the information with the Nazi regime.

IBM plans on moving 25% of parts of the workforce to India and China. India is our ally and a Democracy, but China is a rival.

This is going to hurt Americans - we'll be working for less money and have a lower living standard, thanks to IBM. But how much will this hurt our national security? What if the CEO of IBM decides to share high-tech with China, but withholds it from the United States? What if the Board of Directors cuts a deal with the Communist Party?

Imagine a confrontation with China over Taiwan, and China has advanced IBM technology that they withheld from us?

I wonder about General Electric as well...

Which candidate will demand that US Corporations be loyal to the United States?

[beawr]

1. A Corporation

is loyal only to it's shareholders. That's actually the law. It may be obedient to the USA, but loyal ONLY to it's shareholders.

[patdem]

3. Then all 'Personhood' should be stripped from corporations

forever and always. You and I would be shot by a fireing squad, but a corporation has no loyalty, it does not deserve to be protected as a person if it cannot be charged as a person!

[ithacan]

4. which is why strong government regulation is necessary

you're right, corporations at this point are loyal only to shareholders (or maybe in the case of many, like Enron, to corporate management itself).

But that's all the more reason why governments MUST keep a very tight rein on the corporations, forcing them to perform in ways that help the stakeholders -- workers, communities, etc.

In Germany, stakeholders other than owners have a say in the running of corporations. The US needs to force corporations to behave differently; threat of revocation of corporate charters is a place to begin.

Check out this site:

http://www.ratical.org/corporations/

Ending Corporate Governance web site

Today, people forget that U.S. corporations . . . were extremely limited in their powers and influence prior to the Civil War. We have much to re-learn regarding the facts of how citizens, at the time of the revolution of 1776 and afterwards, gave state legislatures the power to control the "crown corporations" they had had painful, personal experience of and suffered under, from the likes of the original American "Crown Colonys" -- which were companys -- of the King of England, as well as the Hudson's Bay Company and the East India Trading companies of Europe.

<snip>

When we look at the history of our states, we learn that citizens intentionally defined corporations through charters-- the certificates of incorporation.

In exchange for the charter, a corporation was obligated to obey all laws, to serve the common good, and to cause no harm. Early state legislators wrote charter laws and actual charters to limit corporate authority, and to ensure that when a corporation caused harm, they could revoke its charter. . .

Our right to charter corporations is as crucial to self-government as our right to vote. Both are basic franchises, essential tools of liberty. . .

[arewethereyet]

18. buy some stock, then you can let them know how you feel

and they have to listen. Its funny, I do it all the time !

[AP]

26. Edwards says that shareholders should have greater voting rights, and more

control over the companies in which they hold equity.

I totally agree. American's shareholder voting rights are a joke.

Consider the actions of pension funds in recent years. How did CT, OH, and FL state pensions buy Enron shares on the way down? No shareholder would have allowed that. No shareholder would allow the people who bought those shares to go unpunished.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

32. I agree with Edwards about that

Of all the "mainstream" "electable" candidates, I usually wind up agreeing with Edwards the most (and Gephardt a lot about trade issues).

[sweetheart]

2. its too late

When you approach IBM's Armonk, NY headquarters with your loyalty ultimatum, they'll have a meetup, and shift their HQ to switzerland... battle lost. You can demand the US subsidiary be "loyal" and they'll strip it totally to be just a sales office with a coupla sales guys and presales techies in every city.

Just listing on an american stock exchange is not a definition of a company's loyalty anymore. IBM shares are owned by people all over the world, and the company develops products in countries all over the world.

I agree that the IPR issues are mammoth, but what can be done?

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

5. we control access to our domestic market

IBM wouldn't last a day without access to the domestic US market and federal, state, and local contracts. A Tobin tax would slow down a de-industrialization at NY at least :)

Of course, we would have to get out of GATT, but that would be a great first start.

[sweetheart]

8. But its less than you think

If corporations are going to become nationalist internally, its a real mess. Many of IBM's innovations come from other countries already, and patents are held by the legal entity in a given nation state, not by the global one.

Indeed, you can tax the US operations, or threaten huge fines per day for noncompliance forcing major capitualation, much as how the US has forced canandian banks like Bank of Nova Scotia to show them secret data from accounts in other countries.... but it does create a climate of distrust and drives operations offshore.

There is very little "knowledge" that is american anymore... and the attempt to reverse the multipolar reality towards american hegemony through loyalty can't be effective.

There are simply too many nations with development operations in them to call the corporation US based... germany included... german ops are huge at IBM.

THe US domestic market is a mature market, and the growth markets are in asia and europe. That is not really that great an incentive of what you speak.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

10. well, sure - if knowledge can't be "internal" to America

I don't see why it should be "internal" to IBM either. Most corporations are internal, nationalist entities anyway, the multinationals are exceptions not the norm.

I would support a "climate of distrust" actually, especially when it comes to money and national security. Accountability and transparency are important.

Besides, you and I know both know that foreign operations of multinationals are well stocked with employees of our intelligence agencies, and at a company like IBM, probably whole departments. In any case, multinational corporations need to be loyal to and accountable to the democratic government that chartered them.

[Brian_Expat]

6. "Protectionism"

There should be a social contract that states, very explicitly, that if you want access to American wealth through markets and capitalization, you should follow American standards in your conduct here.

Individual European countries and the EU have standards that state that. "Just setting up a sales office" and hiring three or four people is not enough to do business seriously in Europe -- and not just legally. Culturally, Europeans are generally unwilling to do business with companies who don't understand their markets, and in order to have credibility in those foreign markets you have to have a major local presence.

Unfortunately, that's not been the case with US enterprises, but the theory has proven correct. Next time some billing statement of yours is screwed up and you have a hell of a time getting it corrected, make note of where the people who handle the issue are located. You'll find a call center in India, auditing personnel in Taiwan and precious little understanding of the situation, law or culture for handling mistakes in the USA.

That's what European enterprises and individuals are trying to avoid, and they're unwilling to boost the profitability of companies they do business with in exchange for poorer service. The old canard of "lower prices" is a canard -- most of the savings from off-shoring go into profits. Did your credit card company lower your interest rate and/or annual fee when they moved customer service "off shore"? Of course not.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

7. "most of the savings from off-shoring go into profits"

no into lower prices for consumers, exactly. It helps investors - the richest people in America, and hurts most of us. Just like Bush's tax cuts.

[sweetheart]

9. those sales offices

Whilst i hear your comment, in the technology economy, the entirity of europe is dotted with little sales offices... and not much else.

The companies know that to put development in a place, means that employees will learn the intellectual property and perhaps form competitor organizations and such... so better to keep it offshore from any market that is a threat... and since US employees are too uppity, the US itself is a threat, so development is shifting offshore to india which is already competing with knockoff products.

An example i ran in to not long ago was an indian textile outfit that had taken oracle ERP suites and reengineered the product that it now offers to textile ERP markets at 1/100th oracle's cost. The least common denominator for IPR products is free, and the race to the bottom will accelerate with the shift to india.

[Brian_Expat]

22. An opportunity lies within. . .

Whilst i hear your comment, in the technology economy, the entirity of europe is dotted with little sales offices... and not much else.

And the Europeans welcome a domestic player the moment they arrive. Hence the rise of SuSE in Europe, whose version of Linux is beginning to displace US-based Microsoft in government offices across Europe and growing to smaller enterprises too.

Now that SuSE is part of Novell doesn't mean the staff is being let go -- because Novell now has huge presence in Germany.

An example i ran in to not long ago was an indian textile outfit that had taken oracle ERP suites and reengineered the product that it now offers to textile ERP markets at 1/100th oracle's cost. The least common denominator for IPR products is free, and the race to the bottom will accelerate with the shift to india.

Actually, it will reinvigorate the industry. For WAY too long, the technology industry has been boring and lacked innovation. Apple has been the only real player doing anything interesting -- everything else has been "increase the speed." I mean, they didn't even go to interesting looking cases until Apple did for God's sake.

Remember the tech biz when it had lots of competition and innovation?

Now that the Indians are planning to win the "low cost" game, in order for US companies to stay in business and stay ahead, they'll have to actually innovate, rather than sit on top of huge monopolies and demand oodles of cash to keep things working. They'll have to build products that people WANT to buy, rather than products that people HAVE to buy.

And when it comes to creativity, few countries can match America's capabilities. This new reality will also make entrepreneurship in high tech possible again, after about 10 years of total, boring Microsoft monopoly.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

23. total crap

Total crap. Americans programmers, like their counterparts overseas, are very knowlegable, creative, sophisticated, and efficient.

The problem is corporate executives and their interniceiece quarrels and "intellectual property" law. Otherwise, programmers could be freely creating wealth for everyone, all around the world. That's not some utopian, libertarian fantasy, that's reality. I've seen it.

[Scott Lee]

11. Using a 50 year old story to take a clumsy swat at Dean

My my, you never see the worst till you keep watching on DU.

And please don't insult our intelligence by denying you bring up IBM because Governor Dean gave them some breaks in Vermont.

[bushclipper]

12. two questions for you, Mr. Lee

1. Where is the Dean connection? I don't understand.

2. You have been known to drag up old stories out of the blue on other candidates. If this story is about Dean, how is it different than what you've done?

[bushclipper]

17. checking to see if there are answers.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

13. whoa, wait a minute - what does Dean have to do with it?

When I bash Dean, it's rarely subtle. And while IBM collaborated with the Nazis 50 years ago, they are collaborating with the Communist Chinese regime now.

Of course, Dean should have something to do with it - he should be proposing some real solutions to it, but sadly, no. Same goes for Clark.

[wyldwolf]

15. Scott Lee knows something about Dean we don't?

Nah!

Dean was IBM'm lapdog while in Vermont.

[Scott Lee]

20. There ya go! Thanks so much.

I knew one of you would "get it" (or admit to getting at any rate).

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

24. is this about Dean's secret records from Vermont?

I've heard rumors, but I don't know the facts? I'd love to hear it...

[wyldwolf]

25. IBM and Howard Dean

IBM (IBM ) by far the state's largest private employer, says it got kid-gloves treatment. "We would meet privately with him three to four times a year to discuss our issues," says John O'Kane, manager for government relations at IBM's Essex Junction plant, "and his secretary of commerce would call me once a week just to see how things were going."

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/03_32/b3845084.htm

[Scott Lee]

28. And there it is....the reason for this thread. thank you!

I'm glad you had an epiphany of honesty overcome you to sustain why this thread even exists.

[wyldwolf]

29. Well, not that I started the thread...

And I can't speak for the person who did and who didn't know the above information.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

30. ha ha, I swear I didn't mean it!

Truly, my Dean-bashing (and everyone knows I hate Dean) is never that clever. I picked IBM because they are the ones that announced they will lay off 25% of their Americans workforce and send it overseas to Communist China and India.

It doesn't surprise me that Dean is a lapdog for the corporations - then again, make sure that Axciom Corporation knows I donated to Clark's campaign!

[Paulie]

14. During WW2

IBM froze profits to no more than 2% over COST. Every IBM employee that went to war and returned, got their job back.

I'm not convinced about the whole corporate IBM/Nazi tie, because the way IBM was structured, each country had it's own company. You also have the thing with Ford and the Nazi's too. Looking back, we see what the Nazi's were, but in 1930, who really did?

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

16. well, you would think IBM would have learned

From what I've read, IBM did their best to give the Nazi's everything they wanted, and kept a blind eye to what was going on until it was too late.

Now IBM is doing the same with the Communist regime in China, and sending them 25% of their jobs. Considering their history, we need to be careful.

I mean, should they get ANY contracts that affect national security, with 25% of their employees overseas and much in China?

They can say "trust us" all they want, but our national security is at stake here...

[Paulie]

19. Hindsight is 20/20

Seriously, lots of people did what they did, because of the culture of the time. Even though it turned out to be bad.

China and our culture, we want cheap cheap cheap, we dump our toxic waste in China for hard cash, China keeps buying our debt (2nd after BankOfJapan), we want more and more cheap stuff from China. Look at Wal-Mart, they are basically the front end for China products!

I think having regulations making companies non-persons is a good thing, and making them pay their fair share of taxes as well. But we also forgot to Buy American, or pay for quality over price. It's partly the consumers fault, partly the credit pushers, partly the capitalists. We're all the blame, and we get the country we deserve. We also are losing our jobs, which forces us to buy cheaper products. It's a race for the bottom, and we are letting it happen, so we deserve it.

Vote Kucinich, it will start to change. :) :) :)

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

21. "race for the bottom"

I agree, but we don't have to put up with it. If Walmart doesn't like Americans, they can do business elsewhere. We're not helpless - the United States is the world superpower!

[ozone_man]

27. Let India have the software jobs (Clark).

We'll do something else. Sorry, I had to say that. :evilgrin:

[Clark4VotingRights]

31. Why is this in the 2004 Primary forum?

Seems like it should be in GD Classic.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

33. hey, it helps Clark

You Clark fans finally posted some decent stuff from Clark about globalization and H1-B visas and the like - for a centrist, Clark sounded not so bad. This thread is almost a homage to the campaign today.