PERFECT day to ask this question............

[serryjw]

We have discussed the 1886 ruling that gave 'Corporate Personhood' to corporations....Now this is over 100 years ago...Why did the corporations allow all the benefits we have been given in that same 100 years....UNIONs, OVERTIME Pay, Holidays, retirement ect...WHY is all this happening NOW......America has gone thru hard times before but corporate America has never treated workers so badly as in the last 10 years

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. Fall of Communism

One reason we got a lot of the worker benefits was because in 1932, there was a chance the Communists/or Socialists would become a real factor in American politics. Communism fell a little over ten years ago. The corporations know that bogeyman is dead, and so they will go back to sticking it to the working person, and take back every benefit we have fought so hard for.

[NewHampshireDem]

2. Part of the answer is here ...

The Wal-Mart You Don't Know

The giant retailer's low prices often come with a high cost. Wal-Mart's relentless pressure can crush the companies it does business with and force them to send jobs overseas. Are we shopping our way straight to the unemployment line?

http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/77/walmart.html

Sorry, but there's too much here to simply summarize or cut and paste. It's a good read, though.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

3. Those that have the gold make the rules.

The wealthy and powerful buy our "democratic" elections. They own the media. They control our foreign policy for their own ends. They manufacture and sell trash to a greedy public that would rather shop than think.

They also supply the answer to "Why do they hate us?"

[CrispyQ]

5. Yep. Americans have traded in their citizenship to become consumers . . .

It disgusts me how focused the average American is on consumer goods. Shop, shop, shop. That they were not totally disgusted at a president who advised them to continue to shop when our country was attacked tells me the awful truth about our fellow citizens -- that they are largely sheeople, brain-washed, non-thinking beings. If people would spend half the time they spend shopping, reading about issues instead, it could be the beginning of an incredible difference in this country.

I guess I feel that they get what they deserve. Unfortunately, we don't deserve it!!

on edit: RIGHT ON about the comment that it tells why they hate us!!

[MasonJar]

4. There is something very important going on here. We need to

spread the word, "Never shop at Walmart." Then we need to let companies know that we will no longer buy their products if they deal with Walmart. They have used the heavy hand; after the election, we should let them have it. Ditto sponsors of Rush, Fox, etc. Many companies that like to sell overseas are not that happy about the danger to Americans. We can work that angle on Bush now.

[Kenneth ken]

6. along with some of the other very good responses

add globalization. Improvements in shipping and telecommunication make it possible for corporations to profit by low-wage labor, and to keep in constant contact with their far-flung sweat shops.

But there is no "one" answer; it is a combination of all the things already listed, and more.

Also include a changing of loyalty from nation to corporation. That seems to be a prerequisite to climbing the corporate ladder, and so the loyalties change to the detriment of the nation and its workers.

[sweetheart]

7. Its the civil war

Consider the cold war, as a global civil war between competing
systems of resource allocation in the global economy. One focused
power in the hands of a small cadre of "planners", and the other
left power in broader hands (by appearance) whilst itself planning
its economy just as much.

One side lost, so the "winning" side has been consolidating its gains.

The pukes are the same as the southern confederacy of former times,
and they have subverted the union, 135 years after the last shots
of the civil war, to re-emerge as the new plantation union, and have
been consolidating their "win" in the civil war (aka coup-2000), and
as there are no domestic opposition of note, screwing people towards
slavery.

All war is civil war... and those people fighting against the
walmart imperium in falluja and elsewhere, are fighting "our" war
against the reemergent confederacy. Ironic even more that "muslim"
means "slave"... so they are the forefront of a slave revolt. We are
less advanced in that revolt.... and i don't buy for a second that
boycotting walmart will do the trick. If they keep pushing, more
people will have nothing to lose, and the slave revolt will become
increasingly global.

Remember, "all war is civil war"... and the enemy in fratboy's
War of Terror are the world's poor.

[kayell]

8. Corporate America has never owned such a high percentage of

the supposed peoples representatives before. One issue is that now that in order to win an election, such phenomenal amounts of money must be spent, that contributions from corporations are virtually necessary for anyone to win. Corporations expect something for their investment, and their bought and paid for representatives understand that fully.

And now that the representatives are all corporate owned, they are not going to reform in any real way the campaign finance rules.