America Creating Opportunities for Manufacturing, Pre-Eminence in Technology, and Economic Strength Act of 2022--Motion to Proceed--
Floor Speech
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Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, at a time of massive and growing income and wealth inequality, the American people are outraged at the unprecedented level of corporate greed that is taking place all around them.
Today, while the working class of this country is struggling with higher gas prices, higher food prices, and higher housing prices, the billionaire class and large corporations are doing phenomenally well and, in fact, have never ever had it so good.
In the United States today, while the average worker is making $44 a week less in inflation-accounted-for dollars than he or she made nearly 50 years ago, corporate profits are at an alltime high, and CEOs have seen huge increases in their compensation packages. We have never seen in this country the level of corporate greed that we are seeing right now--unprecedented.
Now, let me just give you a few examples. While the price of gas has soared--it is now $4.25 a gallon on average--ExxonMobil, Chevron, BP, and Shell made nearly $30 billion in profit last quarter alone--just last quarter. Meanwhile, Big Oil CEOs are on track to spend $88 billion this year--not to produce more oil, not to address the crisis of climate, but to buy back their own stock and hand out dividends to enrich their wealthy stockholders.
Here is more corporate greed. In fact, it is never-ending. Amazon raised the price of its Prime membership by 16.8 percent while it increased its profits by 75 percent to a recordbreaking $35 billion-- and, by the way, managed to avoid paying $5.2 billion in taxes. Meanwhile, the founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos, became $81 billion richer during the pandemic and is now worth some $186 billion. That is his worth.
More corporate greed: The price of beef is up 32 percent; the price of chicken is up 20 percent; and the price of pork is up 13 percent. Meanwhile, Tyson Foods, a major producer of chicken, beef, and hot dogs, increased its profits by 140 percent last quarter to $1.1 billion and gave its CEO a 22-percent pay raise last year to $14 million. Meanwhile, the owner of the company, John Tyson, nearly doubled his wealth during the pandemic and is now worth some $3 billion.
Do you want more corporate greed? Here it is. We are looking at outrageously high prices for prescription drugs, and, in fact, we pay by far the highest prices in the world.
Last year, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, and AbbVie, three giant pharmaceutical companies, increased their profits by over 90 percent--a 90-percent increase in profits--to $54 billion. Meanwhile, the CEOs of just eight prescription drug companies made $350 million in total compensation in 2020.
When we talk about corporate greed, we are also talking about massive levels of income and wealth inequality. In our country today, the 2 wealthiest people own more wealth than the bottom 42 percent of our population, and that is more than 130 million people. Two people own more wealth than 130 million Americans.
The top 1 percent now owns more wealth than the bottom 92 percent. Since the Wall Street crash of 2008, about 45 percent of all new income has gone to the top 1 percent. In other words, over the last many decades, there has been in this country a massive redistribution of wealth. Unfortunately, that redistribution has gone in the wrong direction: It has gone from the middle class and working families to the top 1 percent.
Now, I understand that is not an issue we talk about much here on the floor of the Senate, and that is not an issue we talk about much in the media, but it is an issue that must be talked about and, more importantly, must be dealt with.
Now, listen to this, which I think really says it all: During this terrible pandemic when many thousands of essential workers died on the job--they went to work in order to feed their families; they contracted the virus; and thousands of them died. During that same period of time, over 700 billionaires in America became nearly $2 trillion richer. Working people die on the job because they have to feed their families, and 700 people--not a whole lot of people--became $2 trillion richer. So that is where we are today. Desperate workers are dying because they are forced to go to work to provide for their families while the people on top are doing unbelievably well.
Today, billionaires like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Richard Branson are zooming off in their spaceships to outer space; they are buying $500 million superyachts; and they are buying mansions with 25 bathrooms while half of our people live paycheck to paycheck. Is that really what America is supposed to be about?
We are discussing now, in the midst of this horrific, horrific war in Ukraine--there has been a lot of discussion about the Russian oligarchy, and that is absolutely appropriate because in Russia, you have a handful of billionaires attached to Putin who own unbelievable wealth. But what do we think we have now in this country? It is an American oligarchy, as the distribution of wealth and income becomes worse and worse every day.
The American people want those of us in Congress to take action to address the unprecedented level of corporate greed and income and wealth inequality that we are seeing right now. They are sick and tired of large corporations making record profits and in a given year paying nothing--zero--in Federal taxes. They are sick and tired of billionaires paying a lower effective tax rate than a teacher, a nurse, a truckdriver, or a firefighter.
The American people want Congress to address corporate greed and make certain that the wealthiest people and most profitable corporations pay their fair share of taxes. Yet, this week, right now, what are we debating here on the floor of the Senate? We are debating legislation to provide some $53 billion--billion dollars--in corporate welfare, with no strings attached, to the highly profitable microchip industry.
And, yes, if you can believe it--and I suspect there are people out there who really don't believe it, but I am telling you the truth--this legislation also provides a $10 billion bailout to Jeff Bezos so that his company, Blue Origin, can launch a rocket ship to the Moon.
In terms of the microchip industry, let us be very clear. We are talking about an industry that has shut down over 780 manufacturing plants in the United States and eliminated 150,000 American jobs over the last 20 years while moving most of its production overseas. In other words, in order to make more profits, these companies shut down plants in the United States and hired cheap labor abroad.
And now, believe it or not, these very same companies that sold the American worker out, they are now in line to receive $53 billion in corporate welfare to undo the damage that they themselves caused.
Do we need to expand the enormously important microchip industry in this country so that we become less dependent on foreign nations? The answer is, yes, absolutely. But we can accomplish that goal without throwing huge sums of money at these companies with zero, no protections, for the taxpayer--just here it is; take the money.
We are the only major country on Earth that does not guarantee healthcare to all of our people. Apparently, the American people are not entitled to healthcare.
We have the highest child poverty rate of almost any major country on Earth, which has gone up by 41 percent since January because of the refusal of some to extend the child tax credit. Apparently, our working families are not entitled to raise their kids in security and dignity.
We have 45 million Americans struggling with student debt because of the outrageous cost of higher education. Apparently, our young people are not entitled to quality education without undergoing financial distress or, in some cases, decades.
Those people are not entitled, but here we are today on the floor of the Senate because many of my colleagues think that the enormously profitable microchip industry is entitled to a massive amount of corporate welfare.
My guess is that five major semiconductor companies will likely receive the lion's share of this taxpayer handout. They will likely be Intel, Texas Instruments, Micron Technology, GlobalFoundries, and Samsung. These five companies, in line for a massive welfare check, made over $75 billion in profits last year--made $75 billion in profits--and now they are in line for $53 billion in corporate welfare.
My understanding is that the company that will likely benefit the most from this taxpayer handout is Intel, and let us be clear, Intel is not a poor company. It is not going broke. It is not in a desperate financial condition; quite the contrary, in 2021, Intel made nearly $20 billion in profit. We are talking about a company that had enough money to spend $14.2 billion during the pandemic, not on research and development but on buying back its own stock to reward their executives and wealthy shareholders. We are talking about a company in line for a major welfare check that could afford to give its CEO, Pat Gelsinger, a $116 million compensation package last year.
There are working-class people all over this country working 50 or 60 hours a week trying to keep their families afloat, paying their fair share of taxes, and providing $53 billion in corporate welfare, a lot of which will go to a company that pays its CEO $116 million in compensation and provided billions in stock paybacks.
We are talking about a company, Intel, whose CEO in 2003, Andy Grove, said that he had ``no choice'' but to continue to move jobs overseas as he predicted the United States would lose the bulk of its information technology jobs to China and India--which we have.
Now, do we really think that a highly profitable corporation like Intel needs a taxpayer bailout worth many billions of dollars with no strings attached?
But it is not just Intel. Another company that will likely receive taxpayer assistance under this legislation is Texas Instruments. Last year, Texas Instruments made $7.8 billion in profits. In 2020, this company spent $2.5 billion buying back its own stock while it has outsourced thousands of good-paying American jobs to low-wage countries and spent more than $40 million on lobbying over the past 2 years.
But it is not just Intel. It is not just Texas Instruments. It goes on and on and on.
Providing $53 billion in corporate welfare to an industry that has outsourced tens of thousands of jobs to low-wage countries and spent hundreds of billions on stock buybacks with no strings attached may make sense to some people, but it does not make sense to me--nor do I think it makes sense to the American people.
Now, I understand that there will be a major effort to pass this bill as quickly as possible in order to move it to a conference committee and send it to the President's desk. So let me be very clear. I will not support any unanimous consent request to speed up the passage of this bill unless I receive a rollcall vote on two extremely important amendments that I have introduced.
The first amendment would prevent microchip companies from receiving taxpayer assistance unless they agree to issue warrants or equity stakes to the Federal Government. If private companies are going to benefit from over $53 billion in corporate welfare, the financial gains made by these companies must be shared with the American people, not just wealthy shareholders. In other words, all this amendment says is that if these companies want taxpayer assistance, we are not going to socialize all of the risks and privatize all of the profits. If these investments turn out to be profitable as a direct result of these Federal grants, the taxpayers of this country have a right to get a return on that investment. That is not complicated nor is it a radical idea.
These exact conditions were imposed on corporations that received taxpayer assistance in the bipartisan CARES Act, which passed the Senate 96 to zero. In other words, every Member of the U.S. Senate has already voted for the conditions that are in my amendment.
Further, the CARES Act was not the first time that Congress passed warrants and equity stakes tied to government assistance. During the 2008 financial crisis, Congress required all companies taking TARP funds to issue warrants and equity stakes to the Federal Government.
In addition, this amendment would also require these highly profitable companies not to buy back their own stock, not to outsource American jobs, not to repeal existing collective bargaining agreements and to remain neutral in any union organizing effort. Again, this is not a radical idea. All of these conditions were imposed on companies that received funding from the CARES Act and passed the Senate by a 96- to-zero vote.
The second amendment that I have introduced would simply eliminate the $10 billion bailout to Jeff Bezos to fly to the Moon. If Mr. Bezos wants to go to the Moon, good for him. He has $186 billion in personal wealth. He became $81 billion richer during the pandemic. He is the second wealthiest person in America. In a given year, Mr. Bezos has paid nothing in Federal income taxes.
If Mr. Bezos wants to go to the Moon, let him use his own money, not the taxpayers'.
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