{"id":1183,"date":"2008-12-29T09:47:38","date_gmt":"2008-12-29T17:47:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bbrace.laughingsquid.net\/wordpress\/?p=1181"},"modified":"2008-12-29T09:47:38","modified_gmt":"2008-12-29T17:47:38","slug":"the-10-worst-corporations-of-2008","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/?p=1183","title":{"rendered":"The 10 Worst Corporations of 2008"},"content":{"rendered":"

What a year for corporate criminality and malfeasance!<\/em><\/p>\n

As we compiled the Multinational Monitor list of the 10 Worst
\nCorporations of 2008, it would have been easy to restrict the awardees
\nto Wall Street firms.<\/p>\n

But the rest of the corporate sector was not on good behavior during
\n2008 either, and we didn’t want them to escape justified scrutiny.<\/p>\n

So, in keeping with our tradition of highlighting diverse forms of
\ncorporate wrongdoing, we included only one financial company on the 10
\nWorst list.<\/p>\n

AIG: Money for Nothing<\/p>\n

There’s surely no one party responsible for the ongoing global financial
\ncrisis. But if you had to pick a single responsible corporation, there’s
\na very strong case to make for American International Group (AIG), which
\nhas already sucked up more than $150 billion in taxpayer supports.
\nThrough “credit default swaps,” AIG basically collected insurance
\npremiums while making the ridiculous assumption that it would never pay
\nout on a failure — let alone a collapse of the entire market it was
\ninsuring. When reality set in, the roof caved in.<\/p>\n

Cargill: Food Profiteers<\/p>\n

When food prices spiked in late 2007 and through the beginning of 2008,
\ncountries and poor consumers found themselves at the mercy of the global
\nmarket and the giant trading companies that dominate it. As hunger rose
\nand food riots broke out around the world, Cargill saw profits soar,
\ntallying more than $1 billion in the second quarter of 2008 alone.<\/p>\n

In a competitive market, would a grain-trading middleman make
\nsuper-profits? Or would rising prices crimp the middleman’s profit
\nmargin? Well, the global grain trade is not competitive, and the legal
\nrules of the global economy– devised at the behest of Cargill and
\nfriends — ensure that poor countries will be dependent on, and at the
\nmercy of, the global grain traders.<\/p>\n

Chevron: “We can’t let little countries screw around with big companies”<\/p>\n

In 2001, Chevron swallowed up Texaco. It was happy to absorb the revenue
\nstreams. It has been less willing to take responsibility for Texaco’s
\necological and human rights abuses.<\/p>\n

In 1993, 30,000 indigenous Ecuadorians filed a class action suit in U.S.
\ncourts, alleging that Texaco over a 20-year period had poisoned the land
\nwhere they live and the waterways on which they rely, allowing billions
\nof gallons of oil to spill and leaving hundreds of waste pits unlined
\nand uncovered. Chevron had the case thrown out of U.S. courts, on the
\ngrounds that it should be litigated in Ecuador, closer to where the
\nalleged harms occurred. But now the case is going badly for Chevron in
\nEcuador — Chevron may be liable for more than $7 billion. So, the
\ncompany is lobbying the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative to
\nimpose trade sanctions on Ecuador if the Ecuadorian government does not
\nmake the case go away.<\/p>\n

“We can’t let little countries screw around with big companies like this
\n— companies that have made big investments around the world,” a Chevron
\nlobbyist said to Newsweek in August. (Chevron subsequently stated that
\nthe comments were not approved.)<\/p>\n

Constellation Energy: Nuclear Operators<\/p>\n

Although it is too dangerous, too expensive and too centralized to make
\nsense as an energy source, nuclear power won’t go away, thanks to
\nequipment makers and utilities that find ways to make the public pay and
\npay.<\/p>\n

Constellation Energy Group, the operator of the Calvert Cliffs nuclear
\nplant in Maryland — a company recently involved in a startling,
\npartially derailed scheme to price gouge Maryland consumers — plans to
\nbuild a new reactor at Calvert Cliffs, potentially the first new reactor
\nbuilt in the United States since the near-meltdown at Three Mile Island
\nin 1979.<\/p>\n

It has lined up to take advantage of U.S. government-guaranteed loans
\nfor new nuclear construction, available under the terms of the 2005
\nEnergy Act. The company acknowledges it could not proceed with
\nconstruction without the government guarantee.<\/p>\n

CNPC: Fueling Violence in Darfur<\/p>\n

Sudan has been able to laugh off existing and threatened sanctions for
\nthe slaughter it has perpetrated in Darfur because of the huge support
\nit receives from China, channeled above all through the Sudanese
\nrelationship with the Chinese National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC).<\/p>\n

“The relationship between CNPC and Sudan is symbiotic,” notes the
\nWashington, D.C.-based Human Rights First, in a March 2008 report,
\n“Investing in Tragedy.” “Not only is CNPC the largest investor in the
\nSudanese oil sector, but Sudan is CNPC’s largest market for overseas
\ninvestment.”<\/p>\n

Oil money has fueled violence in Darfur. “The profitability of Sudan’s
\noil sector has developed in close chronological step with the violence
\nin Darfur,” notes Human Rights First.<\/p>\n

Dole: The Sour Taste of Pineapple<\/p>\n

A 1988 Filipino land reform effort has proven a fraud. Plantation owners
\nhelped draft the law and invented ways to circumvent its purported
\npurpose. Dole pineapple workers are among those paying the price.<\/p>\n

Under the land reform, Dole’s land was divided among its workers and
\nothers who had claims on the land prior to the pineapple giant. However,
\nwealthy landlords maneuvered to gain control of the labor cooperatives
\nthe workers were required to form, Washington, D.C.-based International
\nLabor Rights Forum (ILRF) explains in an October report. Dole has
\nslashed it regular workforce and replaced them with contract workers.<\/p>\n

Contract workers are paid under a quota system, and earn about $1.85 a
\nday, according to ILRF.<\/p>\n

GE: Creative Accounting<\/p>\n

In June, former New York Times reporter David Cay Johnston reported on
\ninternal General Electric documents that appeared to show the company
\nhad engaged in a long-running effort to evade taxes in Brazil. In a
\nlengthy report in Tax Notes International, Johnston reported on a GE
\nsubsidiary’s scheme to invoice suspiciously high sales volume for
\nlighting equipment in lightly populated Amazon regions of the country.
\nThese sales would avoid higher value added taxes (VAT) in urban states,
\nwhere sales would be expected to be greater.<\/p>\n

Johnston wrote that the state-level VAT at issue, based on the internal
\ndocuments he reviewed, appeared to be less than $100 million. But, he
\nspeculated, the overall scheme could have involved much more.<\/p>\n

Johnston did not identify the source that gave him the internal GE
\ndocuments, but GE has alleged it was a former company attorney, Adriana
\nKoeck. GE fired Koeck in January 2007 for what it says were “performance
\nreasons.”<\/p>\n

Imperial Sugar: 14 Dead<\/p>\n

On February 7, an explosion rocked the Imperial Sugar refinery in Port
\nWentworth, Georgia, near Savannah. Days later, when the fire was finally
\nextinguished and search-and-rescue operations completed, the horrible
\nhuman toll was finally known: 14 dead, dozens badly burned and injured.<\/p>\n

As with almost every industrial disaster, it turns out the tragedy was
\npreventable. The cause was accumulated sugar dust, which like other
\nforms of dust, is highly combustible.<\/p>\n

A month after the Port Wentworth explosion, Occupational Safety and
\nHealth Administration (OSHA) inspectors investigated another Imperial
\nSugar plant, in Gramercy, Louisiana. They found 1\/4- to 2-inch
\naccumulations of dust on electrical wiring and machinery. They found as
\nmuch as 48-inch accumulations on workroom floors.<\/p>\n

Imperial Sugar obviously knew of the conditions in its plants. It had in
\nfact taken some measures to clean up operations prior to the explosion.
\nThe company brought in a new vice president to clean up operations in
\nNovember 2007, and he took some important measures to improve
\nconditions. But it wasn’t enough. The vice president told a
\nCongressional committee that top-level management had told him to tone
\ndown his demands for immediate action.<\/p>\n

Philip Morris International: Unshackled<\/p>\n

The old Philip Morris no longer exists. In March, the company formally
\ndivided itself into two separate entities: Philip Morris USA, which
\nremains a part of the parent company Altria, and Philip Morris
\nInternational. Philip Morris USA sells Marlboro and other cigarettes in
\nthe United States. Philip Morris International tramples the rest of the
\nworld.<\/p>\n

Philip Morris International has already signaled its initial plans to
\nsubvert the most important policies to reduce smoking and the toll from
\ntobacco-related disease (now at 5 million lives a year). The company has
\nannounced plans to inflict on the world an array of new products,
\npackages and marketing efforts. These are designed to undermine
\nsmoke-free workplace rules, defeat tobacco taxes, segment markets with
\nspecially flavored products, offer flavored cigarettes sure to appeal to
\nyouth and overcome marketing restrictions.<\/p>\n

Roche: “Saving lives is not our business”<\/p>\n

The Swiss company Roche makes a range of HIV-related drugs. One of them
\nis enfuvirtid, sold under the brand-name Fuzeon. Fuzeon brought in $266
\nmillion to Roche in 2007, though sales are declining.<\/p>\n

Roche charges $25,000 a year for Fuzeon. It does not offer a discount
\nprice for developing countries.<\/p>\n

Like most industrialized countries, Korea maintains a form of price
\ncontrols — the national health insurance program sets prices for
\nmedicines. The Ministry of Health, Welfare and Family Affairs listed
\nFuzeon at $18,000 a year. Korea’s per capita income is roughly half that
\nof the United States. Instead of providing Fuzeon, for a profit, at
\nKorea’s listed level, Roche refuses to make the drug available in Korea.<\/p>\n

Korean activists report that the head of Roche Korea told them, “We are
\nnot in business to save lives, but to make money. Saving lives is not
\nour business.”<\/p>\n

By Robert Weissman<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What a year for corporate criminality and malfeasance! As we compiled the Multinational Monitor list of the 10 Worst Corporations of 2008, it would have been easy to restrict the awardees to Wall Street firms. But the rest of the corporate sector was not on good behavior during 2008 either, and we didn’t want them […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"","spay_email":""},"categories":[5,6],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1183"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1183"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1183\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1183"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1183"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbrace.net\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1183"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}