The Ex-Im Bank’s webpage for the 3rd congressional district pictures the federal government’s locally elected officials, who personalize commercial government and make us think it represents the common person’s interests.
The people who have brought you national economy have also brought you a government bank that extends credit and credit guarantees not only to Chattanooga companies, but foreign importers who want to buy Chattanooga products.
Washington brings to local economy free money called “disbursements.” Astec Industries got F$2.45 million from Uncle via the Export-Import Bank of the United States, and exported F$2.84 million worth of goods that the bank says were “supported” by federal money. KB International, a Chattanooga chemical maker, took aboard F$1.1 million in loans and exported F$1.1 million worth of goods, according to the bank’s website.
Good news, eh?
But there’s more. The bank has started a “partnership” with the Tennessee Small Business Development Center’s international trade center “with the goal of boosting the workforce by stimulating exports.” Jobs, you will want to remember, is the buzzword to sell G-to-B transfers, loans and loan guarantees. Corporate welfare sells better if the public sees the activity creating employment, that great benefit touted in the retail news cycle. “The partnership,” says bank president Fred P. Hochberg, “will bring foreign markets within reach of Tennessee businesses and support thousands of local small business jobs.”
The words “support *** jobs” doesn’t exactly say that Ex-Im created the jobs, but lets the U.S. enjoy an afterglow following the injection of fresh credit into a corporate applicant. Government press releases, particularly from corporations such as TVA, play this merry game of self-aggrandizement from the bounty of the federal exchequer.
Further down in a Nooga.com report, we are told the bank “is an independent federal agency that helps create and maintain U.S. jobs by filling gaps in private export financing at no cost to taxpayers.” In 2012 Ex-Im approved “$35.8 billion in total authorizations, which is a record,” the story says. The story keeps getting better before the cut. Bank “authorizations” “are supporting an estimated $50 billion in U.S. export sales and approximate 255,000 American jobs in communities across the country.” The bank says it lends to foreigners so they can borrow to buy American goods.
Uncle pinches local economy’s leg on an old bruise
We proles gulp signs of appreciation for Uncle’s generosity in helping local economy exports. But this spendthrift is doing a number on you. He’s giving the pinch, too, upon the widow who lives in the corner house on my street in Soddy-Daisy just before it winds down to the stop sign. She has two sons in military service, and was married to a Chattanooga police captain who died of cancer. From the widow he’s stealing her dollars by debasing their value.
Since Uncle opened Ex-Im’s daddy bank, the Federal Reserve System, in Dec. 23, 1914 (during Christmas, when opponents were out of town), he has run a course of inflation. His program against local economy and Chattanoogans is certain to worsen.
If the widow had been alive in 1914 and purchased an item for $20, the same item today would cost F$465.06. That’s a cumulative inflation rate of 2,225.3 percent, according to inflationcalculator.org.
Are not these national economy benefactors the very ones to whom you have entrusted your retirement savings, your confidence for protection, your healthcare reimbursements and your hopes for your children’s security?
Source: “Federal agency partners with state business development center to boost jobs, stimulate Tennessee exports,” Nooga.com, June 14, 2013
