Monday, October 13, 2003
Dead Peasants
"During the past twenty years, companies including Disney, Nestle', Procter & Gamble, Dow Chemical, JP Morgan Chase, and Wal-Mart have been secretly taking out life insurance policies on their low- and mid-level employees and then naming themselves-the Corporation-as the beneficiary! That's right: When you die, the company-not your survivors-gets to cash in. If you die on the job, all the better, as most life insurance policies are geared to pay out more when someone dies young. And if you life to a ripe old age, even long after you've left the company, the company still gets to collect on your death. The money does not go to help your grieving relatives through hard times or to pay for the funeral and burial; it goes to the corporate executives. And regardless of when you croak, the company is able to borrow against the policy and deduct the interest from its corporate taxes.
Many of these companies have set up a system for the money to go to pay for executive bonuses, cars, homes, trips to the Caribbean. Your death goes to helping make your boss a very happy man sitting in his Jacuzzi on St. Barts.
And what does corporate America privately call this special form of life insurance?
Dead Peasants Insurance."- From Dude, Where's My Country? by Michael Moore.
Dead Peasants Links:
Arkansas Times
Union Voice
Teamster's Online
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