I’m not sure I have much to say tonight. I’ve changed up my schedule from writing in the morning day to writing at night. I’m not sure I’ll keep this schedule, it just seems to be the way things have worked. The day was like most, walks and messing around with web design and reading about SEO. I’m still thinking about offering to help my friend with her site if she wants it (it doesn’t appear in the first few pages of local pet sitting results). But, I also am thinking of a setting up a site as a play site. To see if I can publish obscure content that people are searching for on google. It’s hard to explain, but essentially it’s a way for me to play with keywords and writing to see if I can get a page or two high on google’s ranking.
Uggh the News
I was scrolling through some news tonight (doomscrolling as it’s now being called). I don’t read a lot of the bad news. For the most part, I skim headlines on google news, see what my friends are posting on Facebook, and scroll through Twitter. Because they’re run like th ewild west and they have no editorial standards, Twitter and Facebook are the most vitriolic and misleading. The actual news headlines are curated based on things I’ve read or clicked before and places of interest. I always get some Memphis news, some Tennessee news, Some Bucks County, Philly, and State College news. Sometimes I get news about music or blues and I get a fair amount of business news.
Two stories on my feed got me in my shake fist at cloud mood – both about corporate shenanigans. One report indicates that Amazon had a venture capital fund in which they were helping startups… but, as it turns out, they then created products to compete with those startups. This isn’t the first time Amazon has used their mega power to gain information. Their proposal process for building their second headquarters enticed many major cities to show them all of their infrastructure plans and regional demographics. For most of my adult life, I have love the convenience of Amazon – two day shipping, and every product in the world. For me, they are no longer the ethical choice. When I was in college, I worked for a small independent bookstore. We were absolutely put out of business by the bigger chains and Amazon. As much as I am in awe of Amazon’s ability to make good book and music recommendations – it’s another instance of computer algorithms replacing human jobs – which would be fine if we had a different economic system.
The second story – was actually two headlines that I read about the same company, HCA – the country’s largest healthcare provider. The first headline was from earlier in the day reporting that their profit was up 38% in the second quarter (roughly $1 billion). The second headline was that the nurse’s union will be launching an ad against HCA. Their claim is that HCA has threatened layoffs and has not provided adequate PPE during the epidemic. This ad is based on a number of hospitals down in Florida, but a few weeks nurses from hospitals in California walked out for the very same reasons. It appears that HCA has been cutting staff, selling off hospitals, and not providing their employees with adequate protection against COVID. Add to this that the company received $1.7 billion in CARES Act cash from the government and a total of over $5 billion in various bailout funding. Their shareholders will reap the rewards of the $1 billion in earning while nurses lose their jobs and the pandemic rages on.
This is all very reminiscent of the last economic crisis in which the banks were deemed too big to fail, and executives at large bailed out companies and banks received tremendous bonuses. I don’t know why this country hasn’t revolted yet. Some of our biggest corporations (Tesla, Amazon, HCA, and others) have shown little regard for their front line workers (warehouse workers at Amazon, factory workers at Tesla, and nurses at HCA). They haven’t provided adequate protection against the coronavirus all while raking in record profits. We need to stop treating these mega businesses like benevolent employers who make our economy hum and start looking at them as what they are – mechanisms for generating wealth for their shareholders at the expense of their employees.
The sad thing is, this has been going on forever. Antitrust laws such as the Sherman Act were put in place in the 1890s. Despite a long history of malfeasance, we still put our faith in behemoth companies and let them grow to a size where they are too big to fail.
This wasn’t where I expected to go with this post. I suppose I’m just frustrated when I see the other side of the headlines… that several months in congress is finally considering a way to help music venues stay afloat, and they’re finally introducing laws to freeze rent payments, and they’re finally ready to give Americans another $1,200 – because surely that first $1,200 should have easily lasted a few months…. corporations got billions, quickly and with little accountability while our political leaders dragged their feet on some basic measures that would have helped most Americans. I’m starting to think that we might just collapse under the weight of our own greed.