Dude, Where's My Country_ - Michael Moore [83]
If you are a worker, and not a boss, who considers himself a conservative and hates unions, I have one question: Why? If you want to make more money, “union” is the way to go. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, union workers make an average of $717 a week. Non-union workers like you make an average of $573 a week. Being a conservative is about you and you making as much money as you can. So why stay non-union? Because you don’t want to be part of a group? What do you have against democracy? Some unions aren’t democratic? Don’t join those unions. Start one yourself. That free country you’re always yakking about—that’s what it means, the right to freely assemble. That right is so important, they made it Number One in the Bill of Rights.
“Clean air and water save you money!”
Each year in the United States air pollution kills 70,000 people—equal to the combined number of deaths from breast and prostate cancer. The related health care costs from air pollution have been estimated by the government at between $40 and $50 billion annually.
A 2003 study found that people living near one of thirty-eight Superfund toxic waste sites in New York City show significantly higher rates of asthma, respiratory diseases, and cancer. If you’re not in New York, don’t worry—you’re still getting burned. The Superfund was established in 1980 and drew its money from specially imposed corporate taxes (mostly on chemical and oil giants) and is used to pay for the cleanup of contaminated industrial sites. In 1995, the taxes were not renewed, thanks to Washington’s collusion with the corporate lobby groups who were tired of paying to clean up their own messes. With no new money coming in, the Superfund is nearly gone, and will be completely gone by 2004. And that means that we—you and I—will be paying to clean up their toxic dumps. We paid 20 percent of the cleanup costs in 1994, while the rest were covered by the Superfund. By 1999, the costs were split evenly between the fund and the taxpayers. The projected cost to taxpayers for this year: $700 million. That’s money out of your pocket. But, hey, on the bright side, Bush is trying to limit the number of sites that get cleaned up. And while this may save you money, if you’re lucky enough to live near one of the nearly 1,200 contaminated sites spread out across this country, it may also kill you.
We are falling behind other industrialized nations when it comes to investment in energy efficiency. Britain, Denmark, and Germany are moving increasingly to wind power, while we, with the world’s fourth longest coastline, are doing next to nothing.
If we could get mileage standards in our cars to 40 miles per gallon by 2012, by 2024 we will have saved more oil than is in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve, where Bush is so eager to start drilling. The easiest way to be less reliant on foreign oil is to use less foreign oil! This can be easily achieved by forcing the car manufacturers to produce cars that get more miles to the gallon.
Who cares that it’s a good thing for the environment, it’ll save you thousands of dollars each year, and possibly more!
“Stopping the Drug War will save you money!”
Rounding up drug users and putting them in prison is a huge waste of money. It costs $25,000 a year to lock up a doper; it costs only $3,000 to provide treatment. Even the most expensive treatment costs around $14,000 a year—still far less than prison. Every dollar spent on treatment will save you, the taxpayer, $3 not spent on cops, jails, and replacing that CD player stolen from your car. We are spending $20 billion annually for the war on drugs, a war that is lost year after year. All those police helicopters flying over Chico looking for pot plants could be catching the next nineteen hijackers. You are letting the government fight a war it can’t win.
Plus, keeping drugs illegal doesn’t stop their sale. All it means is that you, the conservative entrepreneur and investor, are making ZERO profit from the deal. All the profits go to scumbags. You hate scumbags. Why let them take YOUR money?