[525] in peace2
Fwd: 280: Study finds global power has shifted from countries to
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Marc Rios)
Fri Feb 2 16:42:45 2001
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Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2001 16:42:52 -0500
To: peace-list@mit.edu, peace-keepers@mit.edu
From: Marc Rios <mrios@MIT.EDU>
Cc: DKM news collective:
Oh my God. What stunning statistics.
>Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2001 15:30:40 -0600 (CST)
>From: Demian Kogan <dakogan@students.uiuc.edu>
>X-Sender: dakogan@ux5.cso.uiuc.edu
>To: mrios@MIT.EDU
>Subject: 280: Study finds global power has shifted from countries to
> corporations. (fwd)
>Mime-Version: 1.0
>
>
>
>---------- Forwarded message ----------
>Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2001 11:19:00 -0600
>From: Joseph T. Miller <jtmiller@uiuc.edu>
>To: International Relations: ;
>Subject: 280: Study finds global power has shifted from countries to
> corporations.
>
>280 folks,
> More info on the "transnational" model from
>misc.activism.progressive newsgroup.
>
>Joe
>===========================================================================
>Global economy: shifting the balance of power
>
> Wednesday, January 31, 2001
> By Suzanne Elston
>
> The balance of global economic power has shifted from governments to
> corporate boardrooms. According to a new study by the Institute for
> Policy Studies, 51 of the largest 100 economies in the world are
> corporations, not countries.
>
> This conclusion is based on a comparison of corporate sales and gross
> domestic product. Put in economic terms, this means that General
> Motors Corp. is now bigger than Denmark, IBM is bigger than Singapore
> and Sony is bigger than Pakistan.
>
> The report, entitled "Top 200: The Rise of Corporate Global Power,"
> cautions that growing corporate power has enormous economic and
> political consequences. This echoes concerns expressed by protesters
> at the World Trade Organization's conference in Seattle in 1999 and at
> the World Bank meeting in Washington, D.C., in April 2000.
>
> As companies transform economic clout into political power, democracy
> is undermined, the report warns.
>
> The report showed that 44 of the U.S. corporations in the top 200 list
> failed to pay the full 35 percent standard corporate tax rate from
> 1996 to 1998. In 1998, seven companies - General Motors, Texaco,
> Chevron, Pepsi, Enron, Worldcom and McKesson - actually received
> rebates for taxes paid.
>
> The corporations in the top 200 list reflect current global economic
> trends. Reforms made by the World Bank and the International Monetary
> Fund have eroded the dominance of manufacturing and natural
> resource-based companies.
>
> Between 1983 and 1999, the share of total sales made up by service
> companies has increased from 33.8% to 46.7%. Gains were particularly
> evident in financial services and telecommunications sectors, thanks
> to a global trend toward deregulation. In 1999, more than half of the
> sales of the Top 200 corporations were in one of four economic
> sectors: financial services (14.5 percent), motor vehicles and parts
> (12.7 percent), insurance (12.4 percent) and retail (11.3 percent).
>
> Overall, sales for the top 200 corporations are growing faster than
> overall economic activity. Between 1983 and 1999, combined corporate
> sales grew from 25 percent to 27.5 percent of the world's GDP. One
> corporation, Wal-Mart, experienced meteoric growth. Sales went from
> $4.7 billion in 1983 to $166.8 billion in 1999, making it the second
> largest corporation in the world. Wal-Mart's work force of 1,140,000
> employees makes it the world's largest private employer.
>
> Despite their market share and continuing growth, the top 200
> companies employ only a fraction of the world's workers. In 1999, they
> employed 0.78 percent of the world's work force, compared with their
> 27 percent share of world economic activity. And while corporate
> profits grew 362.4 percent between 1983 and 1999, the number of people
> employed by these same companies only increased by 14.4 percent.
>
> The IPS study concludes that the threat posed by the top 200
> corporations should become a major political issue in the United
> States and for other countries throughout the world.
>
> Copyright 2001, Environmental News Network
>
> 1. http://www.enn.com/index.asp
>
> 10. http://www.ips-dc.org/top200
> 11. http://www.oz.net/~divyak/thumbs.htm
>
