The stereotype of a Capitalist is an old rich man (usually white) who loves money more than the people in his life. Capitalist are further depicted as always scheming to trick people in order to make more money. And of course these mean old rich men never give a penny to a charity or to help other people, think Ebeneezer Scrooge. It is this kind of stereotype that socialist use to gain support for their political views. It is easy to convince people that are in the lower to middle economic rung that rich people are mean, greedy, and do not care for the "little people." This creates a sense of class envy, and a desire to get back at the man.

The leaders of American corporations and business seem to be doing little to combat this perception. Instead their actions seem to confirm the stereotype and this is dangerous for our society. The actions of Corporate American is squeezing the middle class. More and more there are two types of people. Educated professionals and uneducated service workers. Union membership is shrinking, high paying manufacturing jobs are shrinking, and even lower paying jobs are coming under attack by illegal immigration.

When the average American looks at the head lines they see stories of corporate corruption such as Enron, where the corporate executives drive the company out of business while giving themselves millions of dollars in bonuses. There are stories of celebrity CEOs that make millions of dollars in bonuses by laying off thousands of employees and moving their jobs overseas. Or you hear about companies pressuring Congress into granting more and more H1B visas while refusing to hire perfectly qualified Americans for the jobs. All of these kind of moves have been made to increase corporate profits and enrich the executives and board of directors at the expense of the American middle class.

Is it any wonder that more and more Americans are starting to listen to the siren call of Socialism. Free health care, free retirement, free drugs, and more taxes for the evil business men. Of course none of this is really free. Everything has it's cost and the price of Socialism is individual freedom. I think of Venezuela and other third world countries where a limited privileged few control all the wealth and the majority of people live in grinding poverty with little to no hope for advancement in life. How easy is it for a Hugo Chavez or other Marxist to build up an army of dissent under those conditions. What do the poor have to lose under such conditions?

The reason that America has resisted Socialism for so long is because of a strong middle class and the ability of people to rise from rags to riches. But if the attack on wages and the middle class continues, then more and more people are going to feel like they are left out of the American dream. And if a large enough majority feel that way then there will be a backlash against the corporations. That means more taxes and more government regulations which will put a choke hold on our economic engine. Thus corporate greed may just kill the engine that feeds their wealth.

This could be stopped if our corporations and businesses would step back from their gluttonous feast and realize that if they take care of the workers. The workers will take care of them. They can still be rich, and the companies can still make huge profits, but why does one man need a $100 million dollar bonus? How could they possibly spend that much money? Our companies remind me of spoiled sports stars who demand millions of dollars to play their sport. It no longer becomes a case of needing more money. Instead it is about ego and making more money then the next guy. Sure they are making a lot of money, but many times their salary prevents their team from hiring other talented athletes to improve their team. At the same time, these athletes are alienating their fans and wondering why the fans just don't seem to support them anymore.

Corporations should be doing more to support the middle and lower class workers so that they do not turn to Socialism.

- Thomas Paine 2

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