Don't Go There, Heritage (Heritage Hates Corporate Social Responsibility)
Dan Clore
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/smygo
http://c4ss.org/content/1623
Don�t Go There, Heritage
by Kevin Carson
Jan 1, 2010
In ��Socially Responsible� Corporations: Whose Wealth Are They Spreading
Around?�, Heritage Foundation analyst James M. Roberts proposed an
experiment to test �the market for corporate social responsibility.�
Apple could sell one iPod for $99 and another for $125, with the extra
$26 in the second one going to progressive social causes like the
environment and education. �If consumers wanted to pay the extra $26,
voting with their wallets for a cause they believe in, they could.�
Reason�s Jesse Walker lampooned this proposal, repeating it word for
word with �high CEO salaries� substituted for �corporate social
responsibility,� and the extra $26 going to buy Steve Jobs �expensive
consumer items.�
Seems to me that, in arguing that it�s unlibertarian for a corporation
to offer a limited range of products, and not offering cheaper
alternatives without embedded costs of this or that sort, they�re
leaving themselves wide open. They might have to address the question
of just how many product features and designs result from oligopoly
markets in which people select from whatever crappy choices are put on
their plates. I can�t really say I�m all that surprised the author of
a by-the-numbers Heritage piece failed to anticipate the smartass uses
his �argument� could be put to. It�s about like something Dick Armey
phoned in from FreedomWorks.
And say! Doesn�t it seem a bit odd that the Heritage Foundation
complains about corporations spreading their shareholders� wealth
around, when according to its website it has �more than 566,000
individual, foundation and corporate donors�?
Somewhat perplexed, I attempted to contact Heritage:
�I�d be most obliged if you�d give me a list of all your corporate
sponsors and the amounts of their contributions. Some of them might be
interested in taking up a research proposal of mine, in the spirit of
Mr. Roberts� article: offering two identical products for sale, one
with and one without a price markup to cover a donation to Heritage.�
I never did get that list. But making shift with Google, I found out
that Heritage�s sponsors include Coors, Scaife, General Motors, Ford
Motors, Proctor & Gamble, Chase Manhattan Bank, Allstate Insurance,
Mortgage Insurance Companies of America, American International Group
(AIG), Dow Chemical, ChevronTexaco, Exxon Mobil, Johnson & Johnson,
GlaxoSmithKline, Novartis, Bristol-Myers Squibb Foundation, Pfizer,
PhRMA, Microsoft, Boeing and Lockheed Martin, Honda, Altria Group
(Philip Morris), Alticor (Amway), and United Parcel Service (UPS).
On second thought, those donors may be getting a pretty good deal on the
money they�re �spreading� Heritage�s way.
Perhaps coincidentally, Heritage�s policy agenda seems to dovetail
nicely with the business models of its corporate donors. They seem to
consist disproportionately of corporate welfare moochers and
beneficiaries of protectionism. I mean, Microsoft and all those drug
companies would be pretty well screwed without strong �intellectual
property� [sic] protectionism, wouldn�t they? As for Boeing and
Lockheed Martin -- my goodness! -- if it weren�t for the perpetual
warfare state Heritage so enthusiastically supports, with all its
bloated military-industrial spending, those companies might have to find
actual customers willing to spend their own money on their products.
And I vaguely recall that General Motors and some of those banks and
insurance companies might have gotten a bit of government money
somewhere along the line, if my memory�s not playing tricks on me. So
Heritage�s policy recommendations seem to be rather important for the
business models of its donors.
Maybe we ought to try a different experiment: offering the taxpayer two
alternative tax bills, one with and one without corporate welfare to
Heritage�s donors. Or two consumer prices, one with and one without the
�intellectual property� protectionism Heritage advocates.
Despite their apolitical non-profit status, those Heritage wonks manage
to get some pretty good seats at the policy making table (especially
when the Republicans control Congress). Their 1995 Annual Report quoted
vice presidents Stuart Butler and Kim Holmes: �Heritage now works very
closely with the congressional leadership. . . . Heritage has been
involved in crafting almost every piece of major legislation to move
through Congress.� �Without exaggeration, I think we�ve in effect
become Congress�s unofficial research arm. . . . We truly have become an
extension of the congressional staff, but on our own terms and according
to our own agenda.�
So maybe those contributions are money well spent, after all. If you�re
a giant corporation that profits by sucking off the government tit, I
guess the best thing to do is buy yourself a �free market� think tank to
make sure you�re never exposed to the horrors of an actual free market.
C4SS Research Associate Kevin Carson is a contemporary mutualist author
and individualist anarchist whose written work includes Studies in
Mutualist Political Economy and Organization Theory: An Individualist
Anarchist Perspective, both of which are freely available online. Carson
has also written for a variety of internet-based journals and blogs,
including Just Things, The Art of the Possible, the P2P Foundation and
his own Mutualist Blog.
--
Dan Clore
New book: _Weird Words: A Lovecraftian Lexicon_:
http://tinyurl.com/yd3bxkw
My collected fiction: _The Unspeakable and Others_
(Wait for the new edition: http://hplmythos.com/ )
Lord We�rdgliffe & Necronomicon Page:
http://tinyurl.com/292yz9
News & Views for Anarchists & Activists:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/smygo
Skipper: Professor, will you tell these people who is
in charge on this island?
Professor: Why, no one.
Skipper: No one?
Thurston Howell III: No one? Good heavens, this is anarchy!
-- _Gilligan's Island_, episode #6, "President Gilligan"