Corporations Are Gonna Get Your Mama: Globalization and the Downsizing of the American Dream [Paperback]

Kevin Danaher (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 2002

While Hollywood has replaced politics with silly diversions about alien invasions, many Americans face a tangible fear: the seemingly inexorable grip of corporate power over their lives. Wages have been dropping for twenty years. Income inequality that grew under Reagan and Bush has accelerated under Clinton. More and more people face an uncertain future as the "land of opportunity" becomes a cynical and empty phrase for millions of Americans. This hard-hitting anthology offers an incisive overview of how corporations, long plunderers of the Third World, are unleashing "market forces" like a pack of rabid dogs attacking the American way of life.

In "Paying to Lose Our Jobs," Patricia Horn shows that U.S. women, especially women of color, are the big losers in the low-wage bidding game. Each year from 1979 to 1992, an average of 41,000 apparel workers in the U.S. lost their jobs. Three-quarters of American apparel workers are women, over a third of whom are minorities. This combination makes them the U.S.'s most vulnerable workers.

But some sectors of society are well-off. As Ralph Nader points out in his chapter, Washington is a federal forum whose operating slogan is "Billions for corporations, bills for people." Societies rot from the top down. They reconstruct from the bottom up. Real democracy is not just good for the economy, it is good for peace and tranquillity, for character and local initiative, for justice and the pursuit of happiness.

Yet CORPORATIONS ARE GONNA GET YOUR MOMMA brings you the good news as well: there are hundreds of groups struggling to create more democratic control of capital and the capitol.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Kevin Danaher is co-founder of Global Exchange in San Francisco and is the editor of "50 Years is Enough: the Case Against the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund."

Product Details

• Paperback: 221 pages
• Publisher: Common Courage Press (July 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1567511120
• ISBN-13: 978-1567511123
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,449,293 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A perfect introduction to the evils of corporate america, August 23, 1998

By 

[e-mail] (athens,ga) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Corporations Are Gonna Get Your Mama: Globalization and the Downsizing of the American Dream (Paperback)

This book should be valued reading to anyone who is concerned with the future of the working poor, the environment, or your own freedoms. Danaher puts together great writings from some of the most respected names in the subject. This book is simple enough for your 14 year old and interesting enough to cause any rational thinking and compassionate adult to stand up and do something about the oppression and destruction caused by big business.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Good Primer!, May 5, 2000

By 

Chad Bagley "Chad" (Shanghai China/Provo, UT) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Corporations Are Gonna Get Your Mama: Globalization and the Downsizing of the American Dream (Paperback)

If you think that corporations are inocuous organizations with the public's best interest at heart- think again! This book is a very good introduction to the perfidy of the global economy. Corporations Are Gonna Get Your Momma is a collection of short essays from the most articulate critics of the global economy and it will open your eyes to what many of our leaders are really up to.

Don't be fooled by the comical cover and title of the book. This collection of writings is a serious call to action.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Original sin against the oligarchy, September 8, 2002

By 

James R Rowland (Rockledge, FL) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Corporations Are Gonna Get Your Mama: Globalization and the Downsizing of the American Dream (Paperback)

Rather than repeat the kudos already submitted, I'd like to address the primary cause for runaway globalism. I'm old enough to remember when the American public had far more wealth and power, back in the late 40's through the early 70's, because we were a manufacturing society, a wealth-creating creditor to the nations, a nation that was self-sufficient and we had an elderly generation that could remember the Robber Barons. This book addresses the retaliation of an elite against America. An American people able to fight back against Vietnam and social engineering being rammed down our throats during the 60's. CEO's demanded that Washington do something to bust the unions that were robbing them of "opportunity costs". Earl Warren called for political economists to find a way to neuter the rebellious middle class. Nixon and Kissinger went to Red China to find out how the hell you keep over one billion people busy and servile.

They came back and began the systematic bleeding of America began; starting with Kissenger's go-ahead signal to OPEC. Ever since then, the powerful middle class has been raped and pounded into utter submission and servility. We have sacrificed millions of good jobs to the blamphemous, sophomoric lie of Comparative Advantage. That lie from Hell used to convert a self-contained American economy into a one-trick pony that only a tiny few can profit from. The rest of us have fallen into that hell prepared for the middle class: the massive service sector and all the menial, frivolous jobs you can work to make ends meet. Our elites partly replaced our lost earning power with plastic shackles: credit cards. The security of the American home has been second mortgaged to the limit, again to make up for lack of decent or dignified work. All the while, our manic-depressive, psychopathic, megalomanic corporate elites are laughing all the way to the off-shore bank.

Thirty years of looting, bleeding, and Balkanizing have accelerated social entropy to the point of no return. The only way to keep the libertinism of the masses under control is to restore FEUDAL political and social institutions. Feudalism hasn't been seen in centuries but it's coming. Those wild, out of control, multinational corporations will be our new Kings and Lords. Governments, deriving their powers from the consent of the governed, will be reduced to global civil servants of Global corporations. By law, corporations ARE persons and Global corporations will be the only true "citizens of the world".

No more will the little people EVER dare to fight back! By design, wealth accumulation will be impossible as national economies have been structured to prevent labor from ever having value. There will be an Inner cabal of wealthy Mandarins in every field but they can be replaced without harm to the system if they ever forget who pays their rare middle class pay. There will be a royal caste made up of today's highest CEO's and political figures. They sit on each other's boards, travel, conduct business, and do whatever else without ever having to interact with the massive underclass, struggling to eke out a living as cashiers, dog washers, waiters, convenience store clerks, pizza delivery, telemarketers, title pawn shop clerks, fast food slaves, etc. etc. etc!

What we are seeing is only the end result of plans made over 35 years ago.