Monday, April 11, 2011

The Clever Republican Job Scheme Succeeds!

In August, 2009, I posted an article which explained the mechanism behind one of the most awesome tax evasion schemes, EVER. The article detailed the working s of the INGKA Foundation which is based in the Netherlands. INGKA is controlled by Ingmart Kamprad, who, ahem, was once the owner of IKEA, but now isn't, but perhaps his wife might possibly own IKEA, but not really. It's all set up so that IKEA will stay in his family after his death and even now, the massively profitable international company pays virtually no taxes...anywhere.
Read the post, I think that it unravels the web of interconnected groups and trusts controlling the 40 billion Euro Kamprad fortune in a fairly rational fashion.
IKEA built their fortune by selling furniture, a uniform look for the entire world. The furniture is made very cheaply in their Swedewood plants in Sweden. Swedewood has a reputation for being a great employer but they have decided to branch out, cut corners and start using cheap non union labor in a backwards, backwoods corner of the Third World, West Virginia.
Their first American factory is a model sweatshop, with rock-bottom wages, mandatory overtime, abusive vacation policies, and forced reeducation meetings for employees who support forming a union:
Some of the Virginia plant's 335 workers are trying to form a union. The International Assn. of Machinists and Aerospace Workers said a majority of eligible employees had signed cards expressing interest.
In response, the factory -- part of Ikea's manufacturing subsidiary, Swedwood -- hired the law firm Jackson Lewis, which has made its reputation keeping unions out of companies. Workers said Swedwood officials required employees to attend meetings at which management discouraged union membership...
Laborers in Swedwood plants in Sweden produce bookcases and tables similar to those manufactured in Danville. The big difference is that the Europeans enjoy a minimum wage of about $19 an hour and a government-mandated five weeks of paid vacation. Full-time employees in Danville start at $8 an hour with 12 vacation days -- eight of them on dates determined by the company.
What's more, as many as one-third of the workers at the Danville plant have been drawn from local temporary-staffing agencies. These workers receive even lower wages and no benefits, employees said.
This would seem to be the results of the clever Republican scheme to create more jobs in America by turning it into a THIRD WORLD COUNTRY!

1 comment:

Laci the Chinese Crested said...

Didn't you know, the US is the world's richest third world country. Look at its standard of living and how services and such are being cut. There is a distinct gap between rich and poor.

Worse, the rich are working to get rid of education, health care, and unions.