You've read this quote here before but...
“People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.” Adam Smith
Adam Smith is called by some "The Father of Capitalism." His book "The Wealth of Nations," where the above quote can be found has been called "The Bible of Capitalism." You HAVEN'T heard these here before:
"Mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent." Adam Smith
"It is unjust that the whole of society should contribute towards an expense of which the benefit is confined to a part of the society." Adam Smith
"It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion." Adam Smith
"The disposition to admire, and almost to worship, the rich and the powerful, and to despise, or, at least, to neglect persons of poor and mean condition is the great and most universal cause of the corruption of our moral sentiments." Adam Smith
"Wherever there is great property there is great inequality." Adam Smith
"Most government is by the rich for the rich. Government comprises a large part of the organized injustice in any society ancient or modern. Civil government, insofar as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, and for the defense of those who have property against those who have none." Take a wild guess.
Adam Smith was not the father of capitalism. He wasn't a capitalist for crying out loud! But somewhere along the line, not long after 1776 when "TWON" was published I'm guessing, some rich capitalist thought it would be clever to mislead the stupid people and rich capitalists are STILL chortling and guffawing every time some dope tries to employ Adam Smith in their defense of capitalism.
These are the kinds of games the rich play with the poor. All the fucking time! And, I guess since the poor don't really do much about it, maybe we ARE stupid. Here is yet another example and with an offender I've slagged here before - Westons/Loblaws - as one of the culprits.
The news is about a week old and already it's waaaaaay down the list of the news stories on CBC, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's news website. This was all I could find and it was below news of Dr. Ruth dying, a Waterloo U. hate stabbing, 11.6 billion oil surplus in Alberta, heat the biggest risk of death for BC poor, how tricky it is to predict weather in Alberta, and a story about a pet camel. It's just going to disappear and encourage further similar behavior by big business and our enabling government.
While it is a bit heartening to discover that Canada even HAS a "competition bureau" and a commissioner named Matthew Boswell, the point made in the linked article above (but not in the vid) is a valid one. Government doesn't have money. This is a concept people really need to grasp. The vast majority of money associated with our government is ours. Or used to be before it became tax. When our government tells us it needs more money, we pay more tax. So when the government GETS money, particularly from fining scumbag corporations for screwing the people of Canada, why doesn't the money go to the people of Canada? Call it reverse taxation if you will.
Welp, time to go on one of my trundles here. Matthew Boswell tried to block a huge takeover of Shaw cable by Rogers. He failed. In April of this year the merger went through. As you can read if you just scroll down a few stories in my blog, Bell absolutely SUCKS, so there are now basically two internet and cable providers in Canada - Rogers and Telus. How long before THEY conspire against the public and contrive to raise prices? That's exactly what Boswell predicted they would do. It's coming soon to Canadian cable stores near you.
Look, they're already doing things shadily. In Korea we got internet that was high speed and unlimited for 50 bucks a month. Here we get minutes. Just like on your phone. I just signed up for Telus and am using one of their hubs or eggs or whatever you call it and I'm going to keep you informed on how expensive that is. I'm only doing that because the deal for cheap internet that included home phone and cable TV was a two-year contract. That was information they cleverly kept from me during the sales pitch. Then after agreeing and asking for them to hook me up the day before my online course started, they never came. Nobody called and told me why or anything. I called several numbers and finally talked to someone who told me it could take up to a month to get service. Another thing they knew, but withheld from me. So I cancelled. Well THEN they were calling and sweetening the deal and saying they could come soon and explaining about something called a "drop" that was the problem. Yeah, well that's all well and good, but if you don't tell me about the "drop," you get dropped. I told the service call-girl at the Filipino call center to give herself the lowest grade for customer service too. I've been sent several emails since asking me to rate the service I received from Melissa or whatever her name was. They always say they will record the conversation. You got my rating of Melissa on the recording. Leave me alone!
Anyway, I'm sure there will be other added charges and outrages attached to my new internet provider that I'll just have to suffer with because there are only two left. AND their already outrageous prices are only going to go up like the prices of every staple in Canada.
Which brings us back to the staple of bread. I like bread. It's one of the pleasures of life that age is trying to take from me, but I like bread. While in Korea, bread went from corncrap and cake to some okay white bread and occasionally some good grainy bread. Oh you could pay 20 bucks for a loaf of really good rye or multigrain from an expensive hotel bakery like the Hyatt in Seoul, but I didn't. I made do with what Korea had. Now I live across the street from Ferraro's Grocery where they have a fantastic selection of bread, deli meats, cheeses, Italian stuff... it's great! But it's not cheap. Gone are the days when, living in Nelson when I was 11 or 12, I went to the Super Valu and got 4 loaves of uncut, freshly baked brown or white bread for a buck. Everywhere you go in Nelson you have to walk up a hill or some stairs. I can't tell you how hard it was to walk up the stairs with a paper grocery bag full of warm bread, smell wafting into my nostrils, without ripping off a hunk and eating it. No WAY it would taste as good as it smelled but it was so tempting! Especially in winter. For some reason.
So yeah I love bread. This story is particularly meaningful because of that even though I was not here during the years of the price fixing contrivances that led to the fine. And if you haven't read the article or watched the vid, but are reading this, 50 million, while being a record-setting fine for this sort of thing, is nothing to these companies. To sum it up, Canada Bread - yes, that's the name of the corporation - is being fined 50 mil because Westin/Loblaws ratted them out. They conspired to price fix and between the two, basically every Canadian buys their bread. Weston got immunity so doesn't have to pay diddly and Canada Bread might not have to pay anything either even though it's just a crumb of money to them. In one of the years of the price fixing, just one, they made 1.1 billion bucks. Canadians eat a lot of bread. So I guess at the time of the price fixing, Maple Leaf Canada (talk about rubbing the screw job in the faces of Canadians!) was the majority owner of Canada Bread until it was sold in 2014 to (he's gotta be making this up) Grupo Bimbo, a Mexican multinational. So Grupo Bimbo will claim they were airheads and had no idea about the price fixing when they bought the company. So who will pay? Probably nobody. Well, except the bread-eating Canadians, a phrase that is practically redundant.
So here's an idea: How about instead of a fake fine that will basically be rewarding the government for allowing price gauging in Canada on something we all eat, how about we make these fucking asshole bread companies LOWER their prices? Oh my God! What a horrible concept! That would be GASP socialism! But quote #4 above by the "Father of Capitalism" isn't, right? Give your brainwashed head a massive shake! It's "not very unreasonable" to expect big corporations like Loblaws to contribute to public expense in proportion to their revenue. Buuuuut, here's what we get from Loblaws. Not to mention the price fixing. And never mind MORE than in that proportion. Again, scare word coming, that would be socialism we're socialized to believe. "Oh Mr. Weston, or Mrs. Loblaw, you are so honourable and such a good Canadian citizen!" See quote #5 above.
15 years of Big Bread getting more and retailers getting a little less more and one giant company MIGHT have to pay a tiny fee. TO THE GOVERNMENT. If I'm a corporation following this story I am incentivized. THAT is probably the only reason we're hearing of this. It's an announcement that the Canadian market is wide open for this sorta shit. And, as one might expect, it's going to spread.
The dude in the video said, "This is just getting started." I've reported myself on the unbelievable inflation that has been in my face since returning to Canada. I think it's already started. Price fixing is the order of the day here. How long have I been home? Since March. 3 1/2 months and I'm already missing the free apartments and negligible taxes I got overseas. Now I'm longing for lesser inflation. And although 18 bucks an hour might sound like a pretty good wage, it pales in comparison to what I could make teaching overseas again.
It's Canada Day eve eve here and I have plans to go over to some friends' place and barbecue some buffalo burgers and listen to Canadian tunes and do what we do on Canada Day here. I haven't been in Canada for Canada Day for a long time. I really WANT to get into it and feel good about my country. But maybe more than ever, that is a hard thing to do.
So as usual my Canada Day post is not a patriotic, hooray-for-us, feel good one. I'll celebrate, but it'll be under protest. That's the best Canada can get from me this Canada Day.
Addendum: Just in case you think this price fixing, Covid profiteering, supply chain blaming, etc. happens only in bread and phone companies, here's a little vid to watch:
I have to make a slide show for my course this week so I will be too busy to do the planned follow-up to this post about the Canadian housing bubble that is soon to burst. You'll see vids like this one:
The Bank of Canada printed almost 400 billion between 2020 and 2022? Holy! There was only 100 bill before that? Those are some crazy statements, but like Bobby Reich above says, it seems like the forgotten culprit in all of this is something I've been blogging about for years: corporate greed. The Fed, the Bank of Canada, or any central bank doesn't HAVE to raise interest rates to fight inflation. They only do it every single time because the alternative would be to maintain corporate oversight. Go right back up to the top, government by the rich for the rich will solve any problem they can in any way that will not inconvenience the rich. We act like the rising interest rates are inevitable. They're not. Our corporations could easily absorb tough times like the pandemic created. Profits have never been higher! But instead, we allow them to actually profit from them.
The rich will be chortling and guffawing during the upcoming housing crash and you absolutely KNOW they will be buying up all the abandoned houses at rock bottom prices.
THAT'S what we should be scared of. This market crash will go a long way to eliminating the already shrinking middle class in Canada. But tomorrow I'll try to put this out of my mind and celebrate Canada Day like a good Canadian dummy.
But before I complain without offering a solution, do you know where inflation hasn't been that big a problem? Switzerland. Know why? Price regulation. Here comes that scare word again... "But isn't that socialism?" Well, what if it is? Shall I make you up some tee-shirts that say, "Inflation is better than Socialism?" And shall I charge 100 bucks apiece because of supply chain issues? Actually, that might not be a bad idear... Or maybe I'll just get a shirt that says, "I'd rather be red than do without bread." Oh man, I am SO flagged! lol
Addendum to the addendum:
Let's see what happens with this... A $230 inflation fighting rebate. If you have kids it could be as high as $630. It works out to 2.5 bill. Probably 2.5 bill of Bank of Canada printed new money. ANYthing to avoid price regulation eh?
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