We're Not Broke

Institute History

Description

With the United States in the grip of the worst economic recession since the Great Depression and an unprecedented budget deficit, the conclusion that our country is broke seems unquestionable. At least that's what politicians and pundits want ordinary citizens to believe as they call for massive spending cuts.

Karin Hayes and Victoria Bruce's searing exposé reveals that, strangely absent from this rhetoric, is the infuriating fact that multibillion-dollar corporations are based in the U.S., make money from American consumers, and often even receive lucrative contracts from the government, yet pay nothing in U.S. income taxes. By exploiting tax-law loopholes and spending millions on lobbyists to pressure politicians to protect their interests, corporations pocket billions while the less-connected middle class disappears, and the poor get poorer.

We're Not Broke explores how the government has allowed this inequality to develop and the growing wave of discontent that it has fostered. Presaging the larger wave of protests that have arisen in recent months with the international Occupy movement, the film follows a number of activists who have had enough and are demanding that corporations finally pay their fair share.


(Archives note: see also Karin Hayes and Victoria Bruce's Meet The Artist interview on our YouTube Channel.)

— Basil Tsiokos

Screening Details

Credits

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