charleshughsmith | Despite
the PR about how corporate profits benefit widows and orphans, this
vast wealth is concentrated in the top 1% and the top 5%.
I am honored to share a remarkable data base of Corporate Fines and Settlements from the early 1990s to the present compiled by Jon Morse. Here
is Jon's description of his project to assemble a comprehensive list of
all corporate fines and settlements that can be verified by media
reports:
"This spreadsheet is
all the corporate fines/settlements I’ve been able to find sourced
articles about, mostly in the period from the 1990’s up to today (with a
few 80’s and 70’s). This is by far the most comprehensive list of such
things online. At least that I could find, because the lack of any
decent list is what made me start compiling this list in the first
place."What struck me was the sheer number of corporate violations of laws and regulations--thousands
upon thousands, the vast majority of which occurred since corporate
profits began their incredible ascent in the early 2000s--and the list
of those paying hundreds of millions of dollars in fines and
settlements, which reads like a who's who of Corporate America and Top 100 Global Corporations.
I encourage you to open one of the three alphabetical tabs at the bottom of the spreadsheet on Google Docs and scroll down to find your favorite super-profitable corporation.
Many have a long list of
fines and settlements, and many of the fines are in excess of $100
million. Many are for blatant cartel price-fixing, not disclosing the
dangers of the company's heavily promoted medications, destroying
documents to thwart an investigation of wrong-doing, etc.
In other words, these were not wrist-slaps for minor oversights of complex regulations-- these are blatant violations of core laws of the land.
