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The long, bloody lineage of private equity's looting
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Tomorrow (June 3) at 1:30PM, I’m in Edinburgh for the Cymera Festival on a panel with Nina Allen and Ian McDonald.
Monday (June 5) at 7:15PM, I’m in London at the British Library with my novel Red Team Blues, hosted by Baroness Martha Lane Fox.
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Fans of the Sopranos will remember the “bust out” as a mob tactic in which a business is taken over, loaded up with debt, and driven into the ground, wrecking the lives of the business’s workers, customers and suppliers. When the mafia does this, we call it a bust out; when Wall Street does it, we call it “private equity.”
It used to be that we rarely heard about private equity, but then, as national chains and iconic companies started to vanish, this mysterious financial arrangement popped up with increasing frequency. When a finance bro’s presentation on why Olive Garden needed to be re-orged when viral, there was a lot off snickering about the decline of a tacky business whose value prop was unlimited carbs. But the bro was working for Starboard Value, a hedge fund that specialized in buhying out and killing off companies, pocketing billions while destroying profitable businesses.
https://www.salon.com/2014/09/17/the_real_olive_garden_scandal_why_greedy_hedge_funders_suddenly_care_so_much_about_breadsticks/
Starboard Value’s game was straightforward: buy a business, load it with debt, sell off its physical plant — the buildings it did business out of — pay itself, and then have the business lease back the buildings, bleeding out money until it collapsed. They pulled it with Red Lobster,and the point of the viral Olive Garden dis track was to soften up the company for its own bust out.
The bust out tactic wasn’t limited to mocking middlebrow family restaurants. For years, the crooks who ran these ops did a brisk trade in blaming the internet. Why did Sears tank? Everyone knows that the 19th century business was an antique, incapable of mounting a challenge in the age of e-commerce. That was a great smokescreen for an old-fashioned bust out that saw corporate looters make off with hundreds of millions, leaving behind empty storefronts and emptier pension accounts for the workers who built the wealth the looters stole:
https://prospect.org/economy/vulture-capitalism-killed-sears/
Same goes for Toys R Us: it wasn’t Amazon that killed the iconic toy retailer — it was the PE bosses who extracted $200m from the chain, then walked away, hands in pockets and whistling, while the businesses collapsed and the workers got zero severance:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/business/wp/2018/06/01/how-can-they-walk-away-with-millions-and-leave-workers-with-zero-toys-r-us-workers-say-they-deserve-severance/
It’s a good racket — for the racketeers. Private equity has grown from a finance sideshow to Wall Street’s apex predator, and it’s devouring the real economy through a string of audactious bust outs, each more consequential and depraved than the last.
As PE shows that it can turn profitable businesses gigantic windfalls, sticking the rest of us with the job of sorting out the smoking craters they leave behind, more and more investors are piling in. Today, the PE sector loves a rollup, which is when they buy several related businesses and merge them into one firm. The nominal business-case for a rollup is that the new, bigger firm is more “efficient.” In reality, a rollup’s strength is in eliminating competition. When all the pet groomers, or funeral homes, or urgent care clinics for ten miles share the same owner, they can raise prices, lower wages, and fuck over suppliers.
They can also borrow. A quirk of the credit markets is that a standalone small business is valued at about 3–5x its annual revenues. But if that business is part of a large firm, it is valued at 10–20x annual turnover. That means that when a private equity company rolls up a comedy club, ad agency or water bottler (all businesses presently experiencing PE rollup), with $1m in annual revenues, it shows up on the PE company’s balance sheet as an asset worth $10–20m. That’s $10–20m worth of collateral the PE fund can stake for loans that let it buy and roll up more small businesses.
2.9 million Boomer-owned businesses, employing 32m people, are expected to sell in the next couple years as their owners retire. Most of these businesses will sell to PE firms, who can afford to pay more for them as a prelude to a bust out than anyone intending to operate them as a productive business could ever pay:
https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/16/schumpeterian-terrorism/#deliberately-broken
PE’s most ghastly impact is felt in the health care sector. Whole towns’ worth of emergency rooms, family practices, labs and other health firms have been scooped up by PE, which has spent more than $1t since 2012 on health acquisitions:
https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/17/the-doctor-will-fleece-you-now/#pe-in-full-effect
Once a health care company is owned by PE, it is significantly more likely to commit medicare fraud. It also cuts wages and staffing for doctors and nurses. PE-owned facilities do more unnecessary and often dangerous procedures. Appointments get shorter. The companies get embroiled in kickback scandals. PE-backed dentists hack away at children’s mouths, filling them full of root-canals.
https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/17/the-doctor-will-fleece-you-now/#pe-in-full-effect
The Healthcare Private Equity Association boasts that its members are poised to spend more than $3t to create “the future of healthcare.”
https://hcpea.org/#!event-list
As bad as PE is for healthcare, it’s worse for long-term care. PE-owned nursing homes are charnel houses, and there’s a particularly nasty PE scam where elderly patients are tricked into signing up for palliative care, which is never delivered (and isn’t needed, because the patients aren’t dying!). These fake “hospices” get huge payouts from medicare — and the patient is made permanently ineligible for future medicare, because they are recorded being in their final decline:
https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/26/death-panels/#what-the-heck-is-going-on-with-CMS
Every part of the health care sector is being busted out by PE. Another ugly PE trick, the “club deal,” is devouring the medical supply business. Club deals were huge in the 2000s, destroying rent-controlled housing, energy companies, Mervyn’s department stores, Harrah’s, and Old Country Joe. Now it’s doing the same to medical supplies:
https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/14/billionaire-class-solidarity/#club-deals
Private equity is behind the mass rollup of single-family homes across America. Wall Street landlords are the worst landlords in America, who load up your rent with junk fees, leave your home in a state of dangerous disrepair, and evict you at the drop of a hat:
https://pluralistic.net/2021/08/16/die-miete-ist-zu-hoch/#assets-v-human-rights
As these houses decay through neglect, private equity makes a bundle from tenants and even more borrowing against the houses. In a few short years, much of America’s desperately undersupplied housing stock will be beyond repair. It’s a bust out.
You know all those exploding trains filled with dangerous chemicals that poison entire towns? Private equity bust outs:
https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/04/up-your-nose/#rail-barons
Where did PE come from? How can these people look themselves in the mirror? Why do we let them get away with it? How do we stop them?
Today in The American Prospect, Maureen Tkacik reviews two new books that try to answer all four of these questions, but really only manage to answer the first three:
https://prospect.org/culture/books/2023-06-02-days-of-plunder-morgenson-rosner-ballou-review/
The first of these books is These Are the Plunderers: How Private Equity Runs — and Wrecks — America by Gretchen Morgenson and Joshua Rosner:
https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/These-Are-the-Plunderers/Gretchen-Morgenson/9781982191283
The second is Plunder: Private Equity’s Plan to Pillage America, by Brendan Ballou:
https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/brendan-ballou/plunder/9781541702103/
Both books describe the bust out from the inside. For example, PetSmart — looted for $30 billion by RaymondSvider and his PE fund BC Partners — is a slaughterhouse for animals. The company systematically neglects animals — failing to pay workers to come in and feed them, say, or refusing to provide backup power to run during power outages, letting animals freeze or roast to death. Though PetSmart has its own vet clinics, the company doesn’t want to pay its vets to nurse the animals it damages, so it denies them care. But the company is also too cheap to euthanize those animals, so it lets them starve to death. PetSmart is also too cheap to cremate the animals, so its traumatized staff are ordered to smuggle the dead, rotting animals into random dumpsters.
All this happened while PetSmart’s sales increased by 60%, matched by growth in the company’s gross margins. All that money went to the bust out.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/antoinegara/2021/09/27/the-30-billion-kitty-meet-the-investor-who-made-a-fortune-on-pet-food/
Tkacik says these books show that we’re finally getting wise to PE. Back in the Clinton years, the PE critique painted the perps as sharp operators who reduced quality and jacked up prices. Today, books like these paint these “investors” as the monsters they are — crooks whose bust ups are crimes, not clever finance hacks.
Take the Carlyle Group, which pioneered nursing home rollups. As Carlyle slashed wages, its workers suffered — but its elderly patients suffered more. Thousands of Carlyle “customers” died of “dehydration, gangrenous bedsores, and preventable falls” in the pre-covid years.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/opioid-overdoses-bedsores-and-broken-bones-what-happened-when-a-private-equity-firm-sought-profits-in-caring-for-societys-most-vulnerable/2018/11/25/09089a4a-ed14-11e8-baac-2a674e91502b_story.html
KKR, another PE monster, bought a second-hand chain of homes for mentally disabled adults from another PE company, then squeezed it for the last drops of blood left in the corpse. KKR cut wages to $8/hour and increased shifts to 36 hours, then threatened to have workers who went home early arrested and charged with “patient abandonment.” Many of these homes were often left with no staff at all, with patients left to starve and stew in their own waste.
PE loves to pick on people who can’t fight back: kids, sick people, disabled people, old people. No surprise, then, that PE loves prisons — the ultimate captive audience. HIG Capital is a $55b fund that owns TKC Holdings, who got the contract to feed the prisoners at 400 institutions. They got the contract after the prisons fired Aramark, owned by PE giant Warburg Pincus, whose food was so inedible that it provoked riots. TKC got a million bucks extra to take over the food at Michigan’s Kinross Correctional Facility, then, incredibly, made the food worse. A chef who refused to serve 100 bags of rotten potatoes (“the most disgusting thing I’ve seen in my life”) was fired:
https://www.wzzm13.com/article/news/local/michigan/prison-food-worker-i-was-fired-for-refusing-to-serve-rotten-potatoes/69-467297770
TKC doesn’t just operate prison kitchens — it operates prison commissaries, where it gouges prisoners on junk food to replace the inedible slop it serves in the cafeteria. The prisoners buy this food with money they make working in the prison workshops, for $0.10–0.25/hour. Those workshops are also run by TKC.
Tkacic traces private equity back to the “corporate raiders” of the 1950s and 1960s, who “stealthily borrowed money to buy up enough shares in a small or midsized company to control its biggest bloc of votes, then force a stock swap and install himself as CEO.”
The most famous of these raiders was Eli Black, who took over United Fruit with this gambit — a company that had a long association with the CIA, who had obligingly toppled democratically elected governments and installed dictators friendly to United’s interests (this is where the term “banana republic” comes from).
Eli Black’s son is Leon Black, a notorious PE predator. Leon Black got his start working for the junk-bonds kingpin Michael Milken, optimizing Milken’s operation, which was the most terrifying bust out machine of its day, buying, debt-loading and wrecking a string of beloved American businesses. Milken bought 2,000 companies and put 200 of them through bankruptcy, leaving the survivors in a brittle, weakened state.
It got so bad that the Business Roundtable complained about the practice to Congress, calling Milken, Black, et al, “a small group is systematically extracting the equity from corporations and replacing it with debt, and incidentally accumulating major wealth.”
Black stabbed Milken in the back and tanked his business, then set out on his own. Among the businesses he destroyed was Samsonite, “a bankrupt-but-healthy company he subjected to 12 humiliating years of repeated fee extractions, debt-funded dividend payments, brutal plant closings, and hideous schemes to induce employees to buy its worthless stock.”
The money to buy Samsonite — and many other businesses — came through a shadowy deal between Black and John Garamendi, then a California insurance commissioner, now a California congressman. Garamendi helped Black buy a $6b portfolio of junk bonds from an insurance company in a wildly shady deal. Garamendi wrote down the bonds by $3.9b, stealing money “from innocent people who needed the money to pay for loved ones’ funerals, irreparable injuries, etc.”
Black ended up getting all kinds of favors from powerful politicians — including former Connecticut governor John Rowland and Donald Trump. He also wired $188m to Jeffrey Epstein for reasons that remain opaque.
Black’s shady deals are a marked contrast with the exalted political circles he travels in. Despite private equity’s obviously shady conduct, it is the preferred partner for cities and states, who buy everything from ambulance services to infrastructure from PE-owned companies, with disastrous results. Federal agencies turn a blind eye to their ripoffs, or even abet them. 38 state houses passed legislation immunizing nursing homes from liability during the start of the covid crisis.
PE barons are shameless about presenting themselves as upstanding cits, unfairly maligned. When Obama made an empty promise to tax billionaires in 2010, Blackstone founder SteveS chwarzman declared, “It’s a war. It’s like when Hitler invaded Poland in 1939.”
Since we’re on the subject of Hitler, this is a good spot to bring up Monowitz, a private-sector satellite of Auschwitz operated by IG Farben as a slave labor camp to make rubber and other materiel it supplied at a substantial markup to the wermacht. I’d never heard of Monowitz, but Tkacik’s description of the camp is chilling, even in comparison to Auschwitz itself.
Farben used slave laborers from Auschwitz to work at its rubber plant, but was frustrated by the logistics of moving those slaves down the 4.5m stretch of road to the facility. So the company bought 25,000 slaves — preferring children, who were cheaper — and installed them in a co-located death-camp called Monowitz:
https://www.commentary.org/articles/r-tannenbaum/the-devils-chemists-by-josiah-e-dubois-jr/
Monowitz was — incredibly — worse than Auschwitz. It was so bad, the SS guards who worked at it complained to Berlin about the conditions. The SS demanded more hospitals for the workers who dropped from beatings and overwork — Farben refused, citing the cost. The factory never produced a steady supply of rubber, but thanks to its gouging and the brutal treatment of its slaves, the camp was still profitable and returned large dividends to Farben’s investors.
Apologists for slavery sometimes claim that slavers are at least incentivized to maintain the health of their captive workforce. This was definitely not true of Farben. Monowitz slaves died on average after three months in the camp. And Farben’s subsidiary, Degesch, made the special Zyklon B formulation used in Auschwitz’s gas chambers.
Tkacik’s point is that the Nazis killed for ideology and were unimaginably cruel. Farben killed for money — and they were even worse. The banality of evil gets even more banal when it’s done in service to maximizing shareholder value.
As Farben historian Joseph Borkin wrote, the company “reduced slave labor to a consumable raw material, a human ore from which the mineral of life was systematically extracted”:
https://www.scribd.com/document/517797736/The-Crime-and-Punishment-of-I-G-Farben
Farben’s connection to the Nazis was a the subject of Germany’s Master Plan: The Story of Industrial Offensive, a 1943 bestseller by Borkin, who was also an antitrust lawyer. It described how Farben had manipulated global commodities markets in order to create shortages that “guaranteed Hitler’s early victories.”
Master Plan became a rallying point in the movement to shatter corporate power. But large US firms like Dow Chemical and Standard Oil waged war on the book, demanding that it be retracted. Borkin was forced into resignation and obscurity in 1945.
Meanwhile, in Nuremberg, 24 Farben executives were tried for their war crimes, and they cited their obligations to their shareholders in their defense. All but five were acquitted on this basis.
Seen in that light, the plunderers of today’s PE firms are part of a long and dishonorable tradition, one that puts profit ahead of every other priority or consideration. It’s a defense that wowed the judges at Nuremberg, so should we be surprised that it still plays in 2023?
Tkacik is frustrated that neither of these books have much to offer by way of solutions, but she understands why that would be. After all, if we can’t even close the carried interest tax loophole, how can we hope to do anything meaningful?
“Carried interest” comes up in every election cycle. Most of us assume it has something to do with “interest payments,” but that’s not true. The carried interest loophole relates to the “interest” that 16th-century sea captains had in their cargo. It’s a 600-year-old tax loophole that private equity bosses use to pay little or no tax on their billions. The fact that it’s still on the books tells you everything you need to know about whether our political class wants to do anything about PE’s plundering.
Notwithstanding Tkacik’s (entirely justified) skepticism of the weaksauce remedies proposed in these books, there is some hope of meaningful action. Private equity’s rollups are only possible because they skate under the $101m threshold for merger scrutiny. However, there is good — but unenforced — law that allows antitrust enforcers to block these mergers. This is the “incipiency standard” — Sec 7 of the Clayton Act — the idea that a relatively small merger might not be big enough to trigger enforcement action on its own, but regulators can still act to block it if it creates an incipient monopoly.
https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/16/schumpeterian-terrorism/#deliberately-broken
The US has a new crop of aggressive — fearless — top antitrust enforcers and they’ve been systematically reviving these old laws to go after monopolies.
That’s long overdue. Markets are machines for eroding our moral values: “In comparison to non-market decisions, moral standards are significantly lower if people participate in markets.”
https://web.archive.org/web/20130607154129/https://www.uni-bonn.de/Press-releases/markets-erode-moral-values
The crimes that monsters commit in the name of ideology pale in comparison to the crimes the wealthy commit for money.
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Catch me on tour with Red Team Blues in Edinburgh, London, and Berlin!
If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
https://pluralistic.net/2023/06/02/plunderers/#farbenizers
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[Image ID: An overgrown graveyard, rendered in silver nitrate monochrome. A green-tinted businessman  with a moneybag in place of a head looms up from behind a gravestone. The right side of the image is spattered in blood.]
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mitchipedia · 10 months
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Cory Doctorow: The long lineage of private equity’s looting
Fans of the Sopranos will remember the “bust out” as a mob tactic in which a business is taken over, loaded up with debt, and driven into the ground, wrecking the lives of the business’s workers, customers and suppliers. When the mafia does this, we call it a bust out; when Wall Street does it, we call it “private equity.”
For years, the crooks who ran these ops did a brisk trade in blaming the internet. Why did Sears tank? Everyone knows that the 19th century business was an antique, incapable of mounting a challenge in the age of e-commerce. That was a great smokescreen for an old-fashioned bust out that saw corporate looters make off with hundreds of millions, leaving behind empty storefronts and emptier pension accounts for the workers who built the wealth the looters stole:
https://prospect.org/economy/vulture-capitalism-killed-sears/
Same goes for Toys R Us: it wasn’t Amazon that killed the iconic toy retailer – it was the PE bosses who extracted $200m from the chain, then walked away, hands in pockets and whistling, while the businesses collapsed and the workers got zero severance:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/business/wp/2018/06/01/how-can-they-walk-away-with-millions-and-leave-workers-with-zero-toys-r-us-workers-say-they-deserve-severance/
It’s a good racket – for the racketeers. Private equity has grown from a finance sideshow to Wall Street’s apex predator, and it’s devouring the real economy through a string of audactious bust outs, each more consequential and depraved than the last.
PE shows that it can turn profitable businesses gigantic windfalls, sticking the rest of us with the job of sorting out the smoking craters they leave behind,
Today, the PE sector loves a rollup, which is when they buy several related businesses and merge them into one firm. The nominal business-case for a rollup is that the new, bigger firm is more “efficient.” In reality, a rollup’s strength is in eliminating competition. When all the pet groomers, or funeral homes, or urgent care clinics for ten miles share the same owner, they can raise prices, lower wages, and fuck over suppliers.
PE’s most ghastly impact is felt in the health care sector. Whole towns' worth of emergency rooms, family practices, labs and other health firms have been scooped up by PE, which has spent more than $1t since 2012 on health acquisitions:
https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/17/the-doctor-will-fleece-you-now/#pe-in-full-effect
Once a health care company is owned by PE, it is significantly more likely to commit medicare fraud. It also cuts wages and staffing for doctors and nurses. PE-owned facilities do more unnecessary and often dangerous procedures. Appointments get shorter. The companies get embroiled in kickback scandals.
As bad as PE is for healthcare, it’s worse for long-term care. PE-owned nursing homes are charnel houses, and there’s a particularly nasty PE scam where elderly patients are tricked into signing up for palliative care, which is never delivered (and isn’t needed, because the patients aren’t dying!). These fake “hospices” get huge payouts from medicare – and the patient is made permanently ineligible for future medicare, because they are recorded being in their final decline:
https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/26/death-panels/#what-the-heck-is-going-on-with-CMS
Private equity is behind the mass rollup of single-family homes across America. Wall Street landlords are the worst landlords in America, who load up your rent with junk fees, leave your home in a state of dangerous disrepair, and evict you at the drop of a hat:
https://pluralistic.net/2021/08/16/die-miete-ist-zu-hoch/#assets-v-human-rights
As these houses decay through neglect, private equity makes a bundle from tenants and even more borrowing against the houses. In a few short years, much of America’s desperately undersupplied housing stock will be beyond repair. It’s a bust out.
You know all those exploding trains filled with dangerous chemicals that poison entire towns? Private equity bust outs:
https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/04/up-your-nose/#rail-barons
PetSmart – looted for $30 billion by RaymondSvider and his PE fund BC Partners – is a slaughterhouse for animals. The company systematically neglects animals – failing to pay workers to come in and feed them, say, or refusing to provide backup power to run during power outages, letting animals freeze or roast to death. Though PetSmart has its own vet clinics, the company doesn’t want to pay its vets to nurse the animals it damages, so it denies them care. But the company is also too cheap to euthanize those animals, so it lets them starve to death. PetSmart is also too cheap to cremate the animals, so its traumatized staff are ordered to smuggle the dead, rotting animals into random dumpsters.
All this happened while PetSmart’s sales increased by 60%, matched by growth in the company’s gross margins. All that money went to the bust out.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/antoinegara/2021/09/27/the-30-billion-kitty-meet-the-investor-who-made-a-fortune-on-pet-food/
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rmrkbl-marketing · 2 months
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Best Dropshipping Suppliers in 2024
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Introduction
As seasoned experts in e-commerce, more than once we have been asked this burning question: "What are the best dropshipping suppliers and wholesalers for my online store?"
Well, don’t worry, we at RMRKBL Marketing have meticulously created this guide to help you drive unparalleled success in the dynamic world of dropshipping.
Unraveling the Dropshipping Conundrum
What is dropshipping?
Dropshipping is not just a method of fulfillment; it has changed the world of e-commerce. It allowed online retailers to operate without the worry of inventory, and to collaborate with suppliers who handle the storage, packaging, and direct shipping to customers. The art of dropshipping thrives on retailers marking up supplier prices, and making profits without the weight of physical stock.
The Apex Predators of Dropshipping Suppliers
1. AliExpress: Global Nexus of Opportunities
AliExpress is an international colossus, bridging e-commerce platforms to an expansive array of dropshipping providers. With over 100 million products spanning fashion, electronics, and more, AliExpress is used both by novices and veterans. It has a worldwide reach, shipping to 220 countries.
2. Alibaba: B2B Mastery
When it comes to B2B, Alibaba reigns supreme. A juggernaut with 2.8 million suppliers across 5,900 categories, it is full of advanced dropshippers seeking private-label manufacturing. While patience is a virtue in awaiting its deliveries, the scope of offerings and direct transactions with manufacturers make it a formidable choice.
3. SaleHoo: Wholesalers' Utopia
SaleHoo's portfolio of over 8,000 wholesalers resonates with eBay and Amazon enthusiasts. Its $27 monthly fee (come on, that’s exceptional value) opens the gates to a world where AliExpress synergy is a mere click away. It also has an expansive market reach, serving the US, UK, Australia, and New Zealand.
4. Worldwide Brands: Legacy of Legitimacy
Established in 1999, Worldwide Brands boasts a legacy etched in its legitimacy. It has a stringent set of guidelines, leading to a treasure trove of over 16 million certified wholesale products. Yes, it is a bastion of quality, filled with a world-class wholesale directory.
5. Doba: Integration Marvel
Doba has a particular advantage; it integrates seamlessly with suppliers, offering a centralized interface for streamlined operations. With $24.99 per month, you get access to over two million products.
6. Sunrise Wholesale: Efficiency Embodied
Sunrise Wholesale, a platform with 10,000+ dropshipping products, can quickly ship to the US and Canada within one to two days. Armed with sales reporting tools and automatic price adjustments, it’s perfect for merchants who prioritize prompt delivery.
7. Wholesale2b: Automation Symphony
Wholesale2b shows you inventory in real time and integrates orders and tracking seamlessly into your Shopify store. With a repertoire exceeding a million dropship-ready products, it offers many niche possibilities for North American dropshippers.
8. Megagoods: Electronics Extravaganza
Megagoods emerges as the wholesale place to be for consumer electronics. Unleashing a plethora of products without minimum purchase requirements, it opens avenues for international ventures from its base in Santa Clarita, California.
9. Wholesale Central: Free Expanse
Wholesale Central allows you access without charges. With over 1,400 dropshippers and 700,000 products, it's perfect as an exploratory journey.
10. Modalyst: Brand Symphony
Modalyst has an automated vendor dropshipping app that integrates with seamlessly with Shopify stores. Partnering with brand behemoths like Calvin Klein, it offers a curated list of independent and trendy brands, perfect for Shopify aficionados!
11. Spocket: Shopify Synchrony
Spocket, another Shopify jewel, has dropshipping suppliers worldwide. Its Vancouver roots spread across the US, Europe, Australia, and Brazil, offering a plethora of product categories for a seamless dropshipping experience.
12. CJDropshipping: Affordable Marketplace
CJDropshipping, a marketplace and wholesale dropshippers list, has the allure of its affordability. Leveraging US-based warehouses and a diversified product range sourced from 1688 and Taobao, it pledges an economical path to scaling your dropshipping empire.
13. CROV: Curated Elegance
CROV connects retailers to a pantheon of US dropshipping wholesalers. With a unique product request feature and a US warehouse ensuring quick domestic orders, it's a curated journey into 35,000 products spanning diverse categories.
How to Spot Fake Dropshipping Wholesalers
Navigating the labyrinth of dropshipping demands precision from you. Beware of "fake" suppliers; their hidden fees are red flags. Genuine wholesalers don't burden you with monthly fees. Stay vigilant and let your dropshipping odyssey be guided by wisdom.
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gerdfeed · 6 months
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The more locked in we were, the less Amazon needed to offer us. The customer-friendly, honest search degraded as the company began to allow retailers to buy their way to the top of listings, and by 2021, ads generated $31 billion in revenue.
Opinion | Amazon Is the Apex Predator of Our Platform Era
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talenlee · 9 months
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CoX: GG-EZ
Time to time, I write up an explication of characters I’ve played in RPGs or made for my own purpose.  This is an exercise in character building and creative writing.
There were two people he used to be. Once, he used to be a quiet, insular kid who wore hoodies all the time and grumped about being short and feminine but never dared to say anything. The other was a raging, loud, abusive asshole on the internet, winning the game and making everyone involved feel bad. Even himself.
He did lose once though. That loss came with it a dare and a bet and a crossplay and then that got him attention from another cosplayer, and that became a friendship. A friendship that wasn’t based on bullying and winning or on shame and shortness. Took some time, but he learned through it to bring who he was together; he could be a cute, short, prettyboi AND an apex gaming predator AND he could be a friend, all at once.
Then six months later, his friend came back to him and asked him to join her, to pilot a big, stomping, videogame-powered mecha, the realest cosplay possible.
Most of the people who work with GG don’t know who he is. They may know they’ve worked with a heavily mechanised tank called the EZ. It’s quite large, about three meters tall, and defended at all surface levels with an electrical shield that serves pretty well at defending people who are standing around or behind it. Sometimes through brute magnetism, where a lot of metal equipment gets stuck to the outside of the EZ, sometimes it’s through super-science chicanery where the field distorts the path of lasers and pulse rifles.
The EZ is a big, brawling tank equipped with stun pulses. It is very hard to destroy, though it can be temporarily immobilised, and it reboots itself with enough time to run maintenance. Even tearing bits off it is challenging, with the device’s impressive engine letting it use mediport networks to re-teleport components back in place, and re-fuse them, with a glittering hex effect when it does it. It has ranged attacks like charges of lightning and thrown electrical bolts, and it can even speed up for advanced terrain exploration.
The EZ, in its basic form, is a real physical walking tank that can treat the world like a videogame character.
That’s the EZ, though, which often fights entirely without any communication from its pilot. The actual pilot of the EZ, callsign GG, name Gigi, is a short young adult male who fits the mecha mostly due to his being so small, and for whom the mech was custom fitted. He took an unlikely path towards being perfectly suited for piloting this kind of mecha, but he’d never have found it through normal means. Seems that he had a real problem building and maintaining social connections – something that other people notice when they’re talking about the EZ, which normally fights in silence. It’s not because the pilot is being cautious and keeping from talking to teammates, it’s because the pilot is a dick and doesn’t think it’s interesting to talk to other people when he could be sassing friends on personal comms.
In some visions of his personality, this is GG being an asshole, and in others, it’s GG trying to avoid making sure anyone has to deal with him when he’s being in his own mind, pretty toxic.
Mechanics
GG-EZ is a electric armour/radiation melee tanker. Tankers are, if you’re not familiar with the results of the changes, really, really strong on Homecoming, because some people looked at one of the best archetypes and said ‘uh but sometimes a brute makes me feel bad in 1% content’ and for some reason as a result I got buffed in all the ways I like to play. Weird.
Particularly, Gigi’s build is what I consider very, very cheap. It hasn’t got purples. It hasn’t got PVP sets. It doesn’t have ATOs or Winter-Os (which sounds like a cereal. It’s just stuff you can buy off the market, most of which he did at retail and didn’t spend more than a hundred million doing. There’s a lot of room to push the build, and yet this cheap build has:
37% Smashing/Lethal defense
47% melee defense
Capped resistance to Smashing, Lethal and Energy damage
100% global recharge, without Hasten or its attached crash
AoE coverage in the form of Ball Lightning and Electric Fences
Two damage auras, which I love
Room for taunt and stealth infiltration powers
It’s great! It’s a really good, very cheap build that hits a lot of goal numbers. It’ll wear buffs really well, so any large group environment it works great, and the only time it’s a real problem is when someone is asking him to hold down large groups of challenging enemies without any fire support.
If you want to look at the build, you can click this link to do it.
Backstory
Remember that character, Trancer?
She got her start as an idea of using the City of Heroes engine to replicate the Overwatch characters. Not quite replication, but certainly ‘inspired by’ with the idea of cosplay and identity play being a part of how these characters all held together as a circle of friends. GG started out as part of that group, and got refined a little through some roleplays, where he wound up as a hyper-competitive gamer geek who got a little too competitive when he knew the stakes didn’t matter.
The funny thing is I’ve been told is he definitely ‘feels like a male D.va’ but I don’t know anything about the kind of personality D.va has. She’s just a pretty advertising banner for a game I could never get into. Any resemblence is therefore a coincidence.
But I do like a lot the idea that what got him out of his shell and into a friend group was a mix of defiance and play, where someone challenged him and he lost, and he refused to give up on what he was doing just because of that loss. That meant he could run away from or run to the embarrassing task, and rather than give up on it, he pushed himself to do it. Defiance, see.
Basically, it is entirely a story that some guys fear comes about from hanging around trans folk, where what if they trick you into emotionally maturing and having fun with things you find you enjoy doing? Jesus christ, wouldn’t that be fucked up or something.
Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!
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nickgerlich · 1 year
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Shaky Ground
During the boom years of the internet, if you launched an online store, you were a retail darling. That doesn’t mean that all of those early start-ups were wisely conceived or immortal. There were firms that tried to sell fully-assembled furniture, wheelbarrows, and huge bags of pet food. Maybe they were ahead of their time, but those did fail by the turn of the century.


For those who survived the tumultuous dotbomb implosion around 2000, though, they were deemed bulletproof, disruptors of the economy and worthy of our investment, not to mention shopping dollars. And while some folks may today be crying, “Say it ain’t so,” it is true: they really aren’t bulletproof, and there are some pretty significant e-commerce pure plays teetering on bankruptcy.
For those who shun online shopping and have loathed its very existence, they may very well be gloating about now. They shouldn’t, however, because it’s just the market continuing to mature, with weaker players being shaken out in the face of mounting competition.

It’s really no different in the BAM world, which has always had comings and goings of firms large and small. The strongest survive, while the weak close up shop. Life and business go on.
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While there may be much hand-wringing over the current slate of teetering firms, we must note that there are several giants in the room all the time. Amazon. Target. Walmart. It’s the Big Three of retail, and if they see an opportunity in any given product category, they will most certainly step up to the plate. They have, and will continue to do so.


Even having a differentiated business is no guarantee of success, because it is likely it can be imitated. Furthermore, there is always the problem of brand recognition in a busy marketplace. Until you gain household word status, you will have to advertise heavily…and hope that Google puts you near the top of search query results.
The struggles that these companies are facing have caused some to open BAM stores to complement their online offerings. It is counter-intuitive, because now you’re buying into all the old-school baggage of real estate, employees, and so forth, but in order to have a stab at the 85% of sales still done in physical stores, this may be the only way. Better yet, stores can solve the time lag problem between order placement, and actual delivery. Well, as long as it is in stock.
As in all business formats, it takes money to stay afloat. That means cash flow as well as investor capital. Without either, things will become grim quickly. With inflation still continuing, and a possible recession looming, both consumers and investors alike are skittish.
We have seen this all before. The automobile industry consolidated decades ago, with some firms going bankrupt, and others being acquired. Mobile telecommunication is now an oligopoly of three, with some regional hangers-on. Computers are now made by only a handful of large firms, and no longer by a couple of guys working in a garage. It’s the nature of things. It’s how all industries eventually evolve. And now the online sector is beginning to experience many of the same problems that other sectors faced in the past.


Life and business really will go on. The roster will look different in the future. Some of the current firms will disappear or be purchased. New competitors will arrive. But I am a firm believer in this form of Darwinism. It will result in only the strongest surviving, at least for the time, because even the strongest can become vulnerable. Apex predators rule the wild…until another apex predator comes along. It’s like the Burmese python in Florida challenging the supremacy of the alligator.
Meanwhile, grab some popcorn—AMC perhaps?—and settle in for an interesting show.
Dr “Online…And In Stores“ Gerlich
Audio Blog
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kicksaddictny · 1 year
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New Balance KAWHI III
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New Balance and two-time NBA champion, five-time NBA All-Star and three-time All-NBA First Team player, Kawhi Leonard announced the release of the latest KAWHI signature shoe: The KAWHI III. Kawhi debuted the KAWHI III Alpha Predator colorway on Thursday, February 2nd when the Los Angeles Clippers took on the Milwaukee Bucks.
The KAWHI III Alpha Predator will be available at www.NewBalance.com starting February 10th with the suggested retail price of $160. Additional colorways will be launching throughout the season that tap into the mind of Kawhi such as Recharged Chakra, Multi-Dimensional, Sacred Geometry and even one that pull from New Balance’s iconic color.
Made for athletes at the peak of their power, a trio of insights from Kawhi guided New Balance designers in the development of The KAWHI III: responsive, explosive, and lightweight. The KAWHI III was built to bring the creativity of Kawhi to life. Kawhi’s incomparable two-way game informed the shoe’s streamlined look, lightweight upper, and full-length FuelCell cushioning. The debut colorway, Alpha Predator, takes inspiration from Kawhi’s dominance on the court similar to the apex predator who sits at the top of the food chain allowing him to the attack without fear of anyone getting in his way.
“Working with the New Balance design team is always exciting,” said New Balance Athlete Kawhi Leonard. “The KAWHI III brings new technology that allows me to take my game to the next level, and that’s super important to me and I am excited for other players to be able to experience it.”   
The KAWHI continues to use the benefits of a full-length FuelCell cushioning system combined with Energy Arc, that pairs a sport-specific carbon fiber plate geometry with strategic midsole voids, designed to increase stored energy to deliver a higher amount of total energy return. This technology was developed by the New Balance design team with the brand’s state-of-the-art Sports Research Lab and has been seen across the award winning FuelCell Super Comp Trainer and Coco Gauff’s signature, the CocoCG1. This represents the first time Energy Arc technology will appear in basketball.
A minimalist upper design features a lightweight textile and rich synthetic material construction, featuring a seamless half-bootie that connects directly to the tongue. The seamless method is also utilized at the heel with a molded adapt component that provides a more locked in and stable fit.   
“Performance-led innovation and quality are in our DNA, and our basketball shoes are no exception,” said Trent Casper New Balance General Manager for Performance Basketball. “We worked closely with Kawhi to develop a shoe that helps enhance performance on the court and take his, and other basketball athlete’s game to the next level.”  
For more information, please visit www.newbalance.com/basketball.
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vshih · 1 year
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customerservicewolf · 4 years
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I still think about all the times i’ve nearly ended a call at work with ‘ok, love you, byeeeee’ 
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maxismatchccworld · 5 years
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Bloodborne Aspiration
Created for: The Sims 4 by Sresla
Based on the book Vampires Don't Sleep Alone by Elizabeth Barrial and D. H. Altair, the Bloodborne Aspiration allows your Vampire Sim to explore their ancestry in order to reveal their true nature. Found in its own, new Aspiration category, Supernatural, once selected it grants the bonus trait Observant for sims Teen through Elder.
There are four levels to the Aspiration.
Upon completion, the Sim will be awarded one of eight unique traits which aligns them irrevocably with a specific vampire house. Each Bloodborne house has a base mood, an additional bonus reward trait, modifiers, whim set and custom moodlets/social interactions (as applicable).
Download: https://modthesims.info/d/631516/bloodborne-aspiration.html
Get featured: https://maxismatchccworld.tumblr.com/
Cicuta Base Mood: Uncomfortable The Cicuta are Bloodborne whose bodies have rejected the vampiric transformation in some way. They are in constant pain due to inflammation in their joints, their reaction to sunlight is more severe and are more prone to illness.
More susceptible to being Uncomfortable, Dazed, Sad or Tense
Reacts negatively to sunlight even with Sun Resistance
Gains Reward Trait: Night Owl
Modifiers: Fitness (x0.2), Gardening (x0.2), Fishing (x0.2), Dancing (x0.2), Skating (x0.2), Rock Climbing (x0.2), Bowling (x0.2), Programming (x1.3), Video Gaming (x1.3), Writing (x1.3), Writer (x1.3), Astronaut (x0.2), Athlete (x0.2), Gardener (x0.2), Military (x0.2)
Need Decay: Vampire Energy (x0.1)
Custom Moodlets: Orlok's Curse (+10 Uncomfortable)
Whim Set includes: Take a Nap, Watch TV, Play Video Games, Browse the Web, Take a Bath
Interfector Base Mood: Angry Interfectors are ruthless hunters who view humans as livestock. These Bloodborne believe their vampiric transformation is a promotion to the top of the food chain.
Autonomously Drinks Uncontrollably & fights more
Always in Dark Form
Vampiric Run Enabled
Receives negative garlic-related moodlets even with immunity
Gains Reward Trait: Dastardly
Modifiers: Fitness (x1.7), Mischief (x1.3), Charisma (x0.2), Criminal (x.1.7), Manual Labor (x1.7), Athlete (x1.3)
Need Decay: Thirst (x0.1)
Whim Set includes: Be Mean to Someone, Mock Someone, Insult Someone, Rage Run on Treadmill, Stomp Trash
Custom Moodlets: Vampires Don't Ask, They Take (+2 Confident), Apex Predator (+3 Energized)
Custom Social Interactions: Taste Test Your Food (Romance), Demonstrate Natural Selection (Mean, drains target Sim's Energy/Bladder/Hunger/Hygiene, ruins relationship [Friendship & Romance, as applicable] and kills them if they are human, must be standing [not sitting] close to target Sim to use)
Philologus Base Mood: Focused The Philologi dedicate their extended lifespan to the pursuit of knowledge. Bloodborne Philologus are natural scholars although their research may sometimes be more esoteric than practical.
Autonomously reads (and puts away) books
More susceptible to being Bored or Tense
Able to consume and gains Thirst from human food, even with Withered Stomach
Gains Reward Trait: Speed Reader
Modifiers: Scientist (x1.3), Writer (x1.3), Writing (x1.3), Logic (x1.7), Video Gaming (x0.5), Fishing (x0.1), Comedy (x0.2), Mischief (x0.2)
Custom Moodlets: Brain Food (+3 Happy)
Whim Set includes: Read Something, Travel to the Library, Research on the Computer, Finish Writing a Book, Write a Non-Fiction Book
Sanctus Base Mood: Confident Bloodborne Sanctus are rare; they are considered the paragons of vampire kind, possessing strength and power that surpass that of even the most ancient Grand Masters from other Bloodborne lines.
Always in Dark Form
More susceptible to being Bored
Immune to garlic
Vampiric Run Enabled
A natural Daywalker; protected from the sun's harmful rays, even with Combustible Plasma
Gains Reward Trait: Savant, Beloved and A True Master
Modifiers: All Skills (x2.0), All Careers (x2.0)
Need Decay: Vampire Energy (x0.1), Thirst (x1.7)
No Whim Set; Sanctus Bloodborne do what they want, when they want
Tombeur Base Mood: Flirty Taking full advantage of their Bloodborne nature, Tombeur are consummate seducers who endlessly pursue sexual gratification.
Drinks Uncontrollably after WooHoo
Gains Reward Trait: Alluring
Modifiers: Charisma (x1.3), Romance (x1.3)
Need Decay: Fun (x0.4), Social (x0.2)
Whim Set includes: Send a Flirty Text, Tell a Dirty Joke, Kiss, Embrace and Woo Hoo with Someone
Custom Moodlets: The Climax (+4 Focused), A Natural Aphrodisiac (+2 Focused)
Custom Social Interactions: Nip Neck (Romance, functions as a vampiric version of Beguile, must be standing [not sitting] close to target Sim to use)
Transeo Base Mood: Happy The Transeo Bloodborne have assimilated into human society by rising to positions of power in order to amass wealth. As a result, they pass relatively unnoticed, while reveling in the creature comforts that go along with their status.
More susceptible to being Bored or Tense
Able to consume and gains Thirst from human food, even with Withered Stomach
Gains Reward Trait: Frugal & Free Services
Modifiers: Charisma (x1.5), Gourmet Cooking (x1.7), Cooking (x1.3), Sales (x1.5), Criminal (x1.7), Retail (x1.7), Business (x1.9), Critic (x1.3), Mixology (x0.2), Handiness (x0.2), Bowling (x0.2), Gardening (x0.2), Manual Labor (x0.2), Gardener (x0.2), Military (x0.2)
Custom Moodlets: The Finer Things (+3 Happy)
Whim Set includes: Prepare Lobster Thermidor, Grill Steak, Buy a New Computer, Give Butler an Order, Travel to the Museum
Tristis Base Mood: Sad Bloodborne Tristis consider their vampirism a curse. By turns, they are melancholy, filled with regret over their lifestyle or morose and envious of the humans around them.
More susceptible to being Angry, Sad, Uncomfortable or Tense
Gains Reward Trait: Animal Whisperer
Modifiers: Violin (x1.7), Pipe Organ (x1.7), Painting (x1.3), Fishing (x1.3), Charisma (x0.5), Comedy (x0.2), Mischief (x0.2), Veterinarian (x1.3), Pet Training (x1.7), Social Media (x0.2)
Whim Set includes: Call Sadness Hotline, Water Plants with Tears, Send a Sad Text, Cry it Out, Be Alone
Custom Social Interactions: Suffer As I Suffer (Mean, drains target Sim's Energy/Bladder/Hunger/Hygiene, ruins relationship [Friendship & Romance, as applicable] and begins vampiric transformation if they are human, must be standing [not sitting] close to target Sim to use)
Vespillo Base Mood: Inspired Bloodborne Vespillo are the nurturers of vampire society. They possess an innate desire to propagate their species and are excellent caretakers.
Drinks Uncontrollably when pregnant
Gains Reward Trait: Mentor
Modifiers: Parenting (x1.7), Babysitting (x1.7), Gardening, (x1.3), Pet Training (x1.3), Photography (x1.3), Mixology (x0.2), Gourmet Cooking (x0.5), Cooking (x0.5), Fishing (x0.5)
Need Decay: Social (x0.17)
Custom Moodlets: Enticing Intimacy (+2 Focused), Occult Offspring (+1 Energized)
Whim Set includes: Try for Baby, Read a Toddler Book to Someone, Help Someone with Homework, Fertilize a Plant, Turn Someone into a Vampire
Custom Social Interactions: Explain Biological Imperative (Romance, functions as a vampiric version of Beguile, must be standing [not sitting] close to target Sim to use)
As with my other traits, I have re-purposed other, already in-game moodlets which should appear occasionally for the traits they are associated with. Some may not be spot-on, so let me know if anything looks especially out-of-place. Although I've tested the Aspiration and accompanying traits, I do not have all the Sims 4 expansions so there are some aspects I've been unable to test, specifically: Money gains for Transeo, Illnesses for Cicuta (a little wary of this one, but it shouldn't kill anyone... I don't think), Fertility with Vespillo. This, generally, shouldn't impact gameplay if you don't have all the expansions yourself; the only ones required are Vampires and Pets. However, please consider this a beta version of the Aspiration and feel free to report any issues you run into so I can correct them.
Planned Updates
Broadcasters aren't, as far as I'm aware, working in MC4. If/when this is ever fixed, I'll add some in where appropriate
Missing from the unique traits is the final Bloodborne house, Silenti. I need to take a brief break from modding and would rather submit an Aspiration is 90% finished for the time being
I'd like to see if there's a way to add a base trait for any humans who decide to take the Aspiration which I've been working on, called Renfield. If I can't integrate it, I'll just release it separately at some point
More custom moodlets/custom social interactions
Some change if the vampire is cured or the trait is removed with cheats. I'm not sure what right now, but you can bet it's going to be bad
Known Issues
The Reward Trait shows as a blank llama when moused over in-game; as the Aspiration rewards one out of eight traits, I cannot determine how to list them all as potential rewards (and don't think there'd be space, in any case)
Because Supernatural is a custom Aspiration category, it cannot be viewed in-game when changing aspirations. So, Bloodborne can only be selected while in CAS
Technically, this Aspiration can be chosen (and completed) without Cats & Dogs; without it, the Be friends with X animals milestone checkpoint just doesn't appear the Aspiration continues without it. Similarly, the only Reward Trait that requires it is Tristis, as it grants Animal Whisperer. IF you get Tristis and do not have Cats & Dogs, a LE error is generated as a result but all other aspects of the Reward Trait itself function just fine
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Rural towns and poor urban neighborhoods are being devoured by dollar stores
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Across America, rural communities and big cities alike are passing ordinances limiting the expansion of dollar stores, which use a mix of illegal predatory tactics, labor abuse, and monopoly consolidation to destroy the few community grocery stores that survived the Walmart plague and turn poor places into food deserts.
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/27/walmarts-jackals/#cheater-sizes
"The Dollar Store Invasion," is a new Institute For Local Self Reliance (ILSR) report by Stacy Mitchell, Kennedy Smith and Susan Holmberg. It paints a detailed, infuriating portrait of the dollar store playback, and sets out a roadmap of tactics that work and have been proven in dozens of places, rural and urban:
https://cdn.ilsr.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/ILSR-Report-The-Dollar-Store-Invasion-2023.pdf
The impact of dollar stores is plainly stated in the introduction: "dollar stores drive grocery stores and other retailers out of business, leave more people without access to fresh food, extract wealth from local economies, sow crime and violence, and further erode the prospects of the communities they target."
This new report builds on ILSR's longstanding and excellent case-studies, augmenting them with the work of academic geographers who are just starting to literally map out the dollar store playbook, identifying the way that a dollar stores will target, say, the last grocery store in a Black neighborhood and literally surround it, like hyenas cornering weakened prey. This tactic is repeated whenever a new grocer opens in the neighborhood: dollar stores "carpet bomb" the surrounding blocks, ensuring that the new store closes as quickly as it opens.
One important observation is the relationship between these precarious neighborhood grocers and Walmart and its other big-box competitors. Deregulation allowed Walmart to ring cities with giant stores that relied on "predatory buying" (wholesale terms that allowed Walmart to sell goods more cheaply than its competitors bought them, and also rendered its suppliers brittle and sickly, and forced down the wages of those suppliers' workers). This was the high cost of low prices: neighborhoods lost their local grocers, and community dollars ceased to circulate in the community, flowing to Walmart and its billionaire owners, who spent it on union busting and political campaigns for far-right causes, including the defunding of public schools.
This is the landscape where the dollar stores took root: a nation already sickened by an apex predator, which left a productive niche for jackals to pick off the weakened survivors. Wall Street loved the look of this: the Private equity giant KKR took over Dollar General in 2007 and went on a acquisition and expansion bonanza. Even after KKR formally divested itself of Dollar General, the company's hit-man Michael M Calbert stayed on the board, rising to chairman.
The dollar store market is a duopoly. Dollar General's rival is Dollar Tree, another gelatinous cube of a company that grew by absorbing many of its competitors, using Wall Street's money. These acquisitions are now notorious for the weaknesses they exposed in antitrust practice. For example, when Dollar Tree bought Family Dollar, growing to 14,000 stores, the FTC waved the merger through on condition that the new business sell off 330 of them. These ineffectual and pointless merger conditions are emblematic of the inadequacy of antitrust as it was practiced from the Reagan administration until the sea-change under Biden, and Dollar Tree/Family Dollar is the poster child for more muscular enforcement.
The duopoly has only grown since then. Today, Dollar General and Dollar Tree have more than 34,000 US outlets - more than Starbucks, #Walmart, McDonalds and Target - combined.
Destroying a community's grocery store rips out its heart. Neighborhoods without decent access to groceries impose a tax on their already-struggling residents, forcing them to spend hours traveling to more affluent places, or living off the highly processed, deceptively priced (more on this later) goods for sale on the dollar store shelves.
Take Cleveland, once served by a small family chain called Dave's Market that had served its communities since the 1920s. Dave's store in the Collinwood neighborhood was targeted by Family Dollar and Dollar General, which opened seven stores within two miles of the Dave's outlet. The dollar stores targeted the only profitable part of Dave's business - the packaged goods (fresh produce is a money-loser, subsidized by packaged good).
The dollar stores used a mix of predatory buying and "cheater sizes" (packaged goods that are 10-20% smaller than those sold in regular outlets, which are not available to other retailers) to sell goods at prices that Dave's couldn't match, driving Dave's out of business.
Typical dollar stores stock no fresh produce or meat. If your only grocer is a dollar store, your only groceries are highly processed, packaged foods, often sold in deceptive single-serving sizes that actually cost more per ounce than the products that the defunct neighborhood grocer once sold.
Dollar stores don't just target existing food deserts - they create them. Dollar stores preferentially target Black and brown neighborhoods with just a single grocer and then they use predatory pricing (subsidizing the cost of goods and selling them at a loss) and predatory buying to force that grocery store under and tip the neighborhood into food desert status.
Dollar stores don't just target Black and brown urban centers; they also go after rural communities. The commonality here is that both places are likely to be served by independent grocers, not chains, and these indies can't afford a pricing war with the Wall Street-backed dollar store duopoly.
As mentioned, the "predatory buying" of dollar stores is illegal - it was outlawed in 1936 under the Robinson-Patman Act, which required wholesalers to offer goods to all merchants on the same terms. 40 years ago, we stopped enforcing those laws, leading the rise and rise of big box stores and the destruction of the American Main Street.
The lawmakers who passed Robinson-Patman knew what they were doing. They were aware of what contemporary economists call "the waterbed effect," where wholesalers cover the losses from their massive discounts to major retailers by hiking prices on smaller stores, making them even less competitive and driving more market consolidation.
When dollar stores invade your town or neighborhood, they don't just destroy the food choices, they also come for neighborhood jobs. Where a community grocer typically employs 12 or more people, Dollar General employs about 8 per store. Those workers are paid less, too: 92% of Dollar General's workers earn less than $15/h, making Dollar General the worst employer of the 66 large service-sector firms.
Dollar stores also lean heavily into the tactic of turning nearly every role at its store into a "management" job, because managers aren't entitled to overtime pay. That's how you can be the "manger" of a dollar store and take home $40,000 a year while working more than 40 hours every single week.
Understaffing stores turns them into crime magnets. Shootings at dollar stores are routine. Between 2014-21, 485 people were shot at dollar stores - 156 of them died. Understaffed warehouses are vermin magnets. In the Eastern District of Arkansas, Family Dollar was subpoenaed after a rat infestation at its distribution centers that contaminated the food, medicines and cosmetics at 400 stores.
The ILSR doesn't just document the collapse of American communities - it fights back, so this report ends with a lengthy section on proven tactics and future directions for repelling the dollar store invasion. Since 2019, 75 communities have blocked proposals for new dollar stores - more than 50 of those cases happened in 2021/22.
54 towns, from Birmingham, AB to Fort Worth, TX to  Kansas City, KS, have passed laws to "sharply restrict new dollar stores, typically by barring them from opening within one to two miles of an existing dollar store."
To build on this momentum, the authors call for a "reinvigoration of antitrust laws," especially the Robinson-Patman Act. Banning predatory buying would go far to creating a level playing field for independent grocers hoping to fight off a dollar store infestation.
Further, we need the FTC and Department of Justice Antitrust Divition to block mergers between dollar-store chains and unwind the anticompetitve mergers that were negligently waved through under previous administrations (thankfully, top enforcers like Jonathan Kantor and Lina Khan are on top of this!).
We need to free up capital for community banks that will back community grocers. That means rolling back the bank deregulation of the 1980s/90s that allowed for bank consolidation and preferential treatment for large corporations, while reducing lending to small businesses and destroying regional banks. Congress should cap the market share any bank can hold, break up the biggest banks, and require banks to preference loans for community businesses. We also need to end private equity and Wall Street's rollup bonanza.
All of that sounds like a tall order - and it is! But the good news is that it's not just groceries at stake here. Every kind of community business, from pet groomers to hairdressers to funeral homes, falls into the antitrust "Twilight Zone," of acquisitions under $101m. With 60% of Boomer-owned businesses expected to sell in the coming decade, 2.9m businesses employing 32m American workers are slated to be gobbled up by private equity:
https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/16/schumpeterian-terrorism/#deliberately-broken
Whether you're burying a loved one, getting dialysis, getting your cat fixed or having your dog's nails trimmed, you are already likely to be patronizing a business that has been captured by private equity, where the service is worse, the prices are higher and the workers earn less for harder jobs. Everyone has a stake in financial regulation. We are all in this fight, except for the eminently guillotineable PE barons, and you know, fuck those guys
At the state level, the authors propose new muscular enforcement regimes and new laws to protect small businesses from unfair competition. They also call on states to increase the power of local governments to reject new dollar store applications, amending land use guidelines to require "cultivating net economic growth, ensuring that everyone has access to healthy food, and protecting environmental resources.
If all of this has you as fired up as it got me this morning, check out ILSR's "How to Stop Dollar Stores in Your Community" resources:
http://ilsr.org/dollar-stores
I’m kickstarting the audiobook for my next novel, a post-cyberpunk anti-finance finance thriller about Silicon Valley scams called Red Team Blues. Amazon’s Audible refuses to carry my audiobooks because they’re DRM free, but crowdfunding makes them possible.
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Image: Mike McBey (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/158652122@N02/38893547595/
CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/
[Image ID: A ghost town; it is towered over by a haunted castle with a Dollar General sign on it, with the shadow of Count Orlock cast over its tower. One of its turrets is being struck by lightning.]
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rudylozanobelt · 2 years
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3 Things Which Make Sharkskin Leather Great
Sharkskin leather has its unique place in the leather fashion accessory world. The best kind of sharkskin leather looks so unique that you are bound to attract questions about it. You can amp up your style with the right kind of sharkskin leather product. Here are the top 3 reasons why you should get a sharkskin leather product this season:
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3 Ways Sharkskin Leather is Better Than Everything Else
Uniquely Marine
Sharkskin leather belt is best known for the thin strips of dark blue streaks you find on its surface. Although you can find products made from the hide of other marine animals as well, there is something very unique about shark skin leather. These strips of dark blue coloration mark this type of leather as a very novel product among all other types of sharkskin leather. Plus, the very idea that you are wearing the curated hide of an apex marine predator makes you have a different vibe from other leather products. Many people would rate shark skin leather higher than alligator leather so the final choice is yours based on 
Fashion Fabulous
Sharkskin leather is incredibly popular for the fashionable variations you can find in the market. You can find all manner of broad dress belts and think belts for more casual outings. The best kind of sharkskin leather is available in many kinds of product types. These differ from brand and product line so you can find something that fits your specific fashion sense and fits within your budget as well. 
Many Choices
Sharkskin leather is widely used in the leather market and there are a ton of products in this category. From belts to gloves to certain types of boots and many others, the choices are abundant. You can choose which type of product you will buy for your 2021 fashion from a top online retailer. Remember that there are different types of manufacturing processes which means that there are many layers of leather quality. Authentic leather in alligator belts is usually the most popular as well as the most expensive. However, these types of products do last the longest and retain their original visual appeal if they are kept properly. You can go for other leather products or ones that fall within your budget but for long-term value, authentic leather is the best. 
Should You Get Shark Skin Leather This Year?
Sharkskin leather is a great choice for all kinds of apparel combos. If you combine the right sharkskin leather belt and apparel, then you can be the most photogenic at any evening event. You can also combine this accessory choice with office apparel for a unique fashion touch. Get the best shark skin leather belt and men’s alligator belt and accessories from Rudy Lozano right now!
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I thought this maybe useful to decide if airtime rewards discounts are for you and if you think singing up to the app will earn you money off your mobile phone bill. The list should be correct for August 2021. If you do sign up please feel free to use my code of
E977QRRT which will give you a head start of £1 plus a further £2 if you make a purchase from any of the above retailers within a week.
Alphabetical list of current retailers with airtime rewards and percentage discount offered on purchases made.
365games.co.uk 2% Ally 10% Ambasssador Theatre Group 4% American Golf 4% Ann Summers 10% Apex Hotel 5% Argos 2% Armani Beauty 3.5% Aspinal of London 10% Bicester Village 5% (over 160 brands including The White Company) Boda Skins 35 (5% on purchases over £400) Boots 5% Bother 10% Brook & Wilde 5% Browns 5.5% Byron  Hamburgers 10% Charles Tyrwhitt 4.5% Charlotte Tilbury 10% Charriol 30% Clarks 5% Coach 10% Craghoppers 5% Crew Clothing 5% Currys PC World 1% Decleor 3.5% Donald Russell 10% DROPBOX £20 (on all purchases over £95) Estee Lauder 8% FARFETCH 5% Feelunique 2% Firebox 3% First Choice 2% Foot Locker 3% Get The Label 3% (5% on all purchases over £60) Gett Taxi 10% Greggs 1 % (5% on purchases over £5) Groupon 3% Halfords 5% Holland & Barett 5% Hotter 5% Hussle 5% iHerb 3% IT Cosmetics 3.5% JoJo Maman Bebe 3% Julian Charles 5% (10% on all purchases over £100) Kiehl’s 5% (10% on purchase over £100) Kindly 5% Kitbag 7% L’Occitane 7% (on purchases over £50) La Roche-Posay 3.5% Laithwaites Wine 10% Lancome 3.5% Land’s End 10% Mamas & Papas 5% MandM Direct 4% Maplin 1% (2% on all purchases over £100) Marella Cruises 3% Megabus 5% Mindful Chef £5 on all purchase over £40 Missguided 5% Muc-Off 5% Muscle Food 1% (2% on all purchases over £75) National Express 2% New Look 3% Now Broadband 25% (on purchases over £10) 45% (on purchases over £28) Numan 10% Nutmeg 1% (10% on purchases over £20) Oasis 4% Origins 15% P&O Ferries 5% Papa John’s 4% Paperchase 4.5% Papier 20% Paul 15% Pooch & Mutt 20% Predator Nutrition 8% Primark 3.5% Q-Park 2% Rail Europe 1% Real Food Hub 8% Reboxed 2% Regis 3% Roov 6.5% Roseland Furniture 6% Secret Sales 2% SkinCeuticals 3.5% Supercuts 3% Superdry 5% Sweaty Betty 8% (12% on purchases over £100) The Body Shop 5% The Outnet 5% The Perfume Shop 4% (6% on purchases over £75) The Protein Works 5% Thomas Cook 3% Thorntons 5% TUI River Cruises 2% TUI 3% Urban Decay 3.5% (5% on purchases over £60) Urban Outfitteres 8% Urban 15% W H Smith 7% Warehouse 4% Wilko 3% YSL Beauty 3.5%
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officialotakudome · 3 years
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New Post has been published on Otaku Dome | The Latest News In Anime, Manga, Gaming, Tech, and Geek Culture
New Post has been published on https://otakudome.com/maneater-coming-to-nintendo-switch/
Maneater Coming to Nintendo Switch
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Tripwire Interactive has announced it’s shark leading RPG Maneater is coming to Nintendo Switch later this month:
ROSWELL, Ga. – March 19, 2021 – Developer and publisher Tripwire Interactive and retail co-publishing partner Deep Silver are eager to announce that the celebrated action-RPG where you play as a shark (aka shARkPG), Maneater is coming to the Nintendo Switch™ system on May 25, 2021. For the first time ever, the open waters of Port Clovis have evolved to go portable. Whether you’re on the go or in your home, you now can eat, explore, and evolve your way to the top of the food chain and become the Apex Predator of the ocean.
Out now on the PlayStation®4 computer entertainment system, PlayStation®5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S, Xbox Series X, and PC (via the Epic Games Store)—and this spring for the Nintendo Switch™ system—Maneater invites players to experience the ultimate power fantasy by controlling the apex predator of the seas—a terrifying shark!
Maneater is a single player, open-world action-RPG (ShARkPG) where YOU are the shark. Starting as a small bull shark pup you are tasked with surviving the harsh world while eating your way up the ecosystem. To do this, you will explore a large and varied open world encountering diverse enemies — both human and wildlife. Find the right resources and you can grow and evolve far beyond what nature intended, allowing the player to tailor the shark to their play style. This is fortunate, because to get revenge on the cruel fisherman that dismembered you will take evolving into a massive shark, an apex predator of legends. Eat. Explore. Evolve.
Maneater Key Features Include:
• Eat: Feed on humans, consume nutrients, and find rare shark loot to evolve past what nature intended.
• Explore the Gulf: Explore seven large regions, including bayous of the gulf coast, resort beaches, industrial docks, the open ocean and more. Experience a living world with a full day/night cycle.
• Evolve Into a Legend: Unlock and equip various Evolutions that improve and enhance your shark as you progress through the campaign.
• Unique Story: Play through a full narrative, story-based campaign narrated by Chris Parnell (Rick and Morty, Saturday Night Live, 30 Rock) and set against the backdrop of a reality TV show.
• Diverse, Compelling Combat: Battle fierce wildlife including other apex predators or fight against various types of human hunters ranging from town drunks all the way up to the Coast Guard.
• Includes the Tiger Shark Evolution: The Tiger Shark is often called the ‘garbage disposal of the sea.’ Appropriately enough, this evolution allows you to digest nearly anything, increasing your ability to gain vital nutrients from all varieties of prey.
With a truly unique premise and never-before-seen approach to the action-RPG genre, Tripwire Interactive looks forward to taking players on a journey through uncharted waters with Maneater.
Maneater for Nintendo Switch releases May 25, 2021 for $39.99 / €39.99 / £34.99 MSRP with an ESRB rating of M for Mature, PEGI 18 rating, and USK 16 rating. For more details on Maneater, please visit the official website – and follow the developers at Tripwire Interactive on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Twitch.tv, and Instagram.
©2019 Tripwire Interactive- published by Koch Media, Austria. Deep Silver® is a registered trademark of Koch Media in the USA and elsewhere. Maneater © 2019 Tripwire Interactive. Maneater® is a registered trademark of Tripwire Interactive in the USA and other countries. All other trademarks, logos and copyrights are property of their respective owners. All rights reserved.
About Tripwire Interactive
Formed in 2005 as a humble independent developer founded by gamers who found success in the video game modding community, Tripwire Interactive has developed and self-published multiple critically acclaimed titles in the wildly popular Killing Floor and Rising Storm franchises, which have collectively sold over 20 million units to date. The studio’s latest project, Maneater, breaks new ground in the popular action RPG genre and finds players taking on the role of a deadly shark with the uncanny ability to evolve as it feeds.
Since then, Tripwire Interactive has expanded its business and now turns its experience and resources to include publishing titles spanning multiple platforms and genres from other talented independent studios. The publishing division aims to help like-minded independent studios bring their titles to market, including Chivalry 2 developed by Torn Banner Studios, Espire 1: VR Operative developed by Digital Lode, and Road Redemption developed by EQ Games and Pixel Dash Studios.
About Deep Silver
Deep Silver develops and distributes interactive games for all platforms. The Deep Silver label means to captivate all gamers who have a passion for thrilling gameplay in exciting game worlds by creating products of the highest possible quality, always focusing on what the customer desires.
Deep Silver has published more than 200 games since 2003, including its own brands like the open world extravaganza Saints Row, the zombie action franchise Dead Island, and the gritty, post-apocalyptic Metro series. Upcoming highlights from Deep Silver include the next entries into the Saints Row, TimeSplitters and Dead Island franchises. Deep Silver also owns the development studios Deep Silver Dambuster Studios in Nottingham, UK; Deep Silver Fishlabs in Hamburg, Germany, and Deep Silver Volition based in Champaign, IL, USA. For more information please visit www.deepsilver.com.
Koch Media is a leading producer and distributor of digital entertainment products (software, games and films). The company’s own publishing activities, marketing and distribution extend throughout Europe and the USA. The Koch Media group has more than 20 years of experience in the digital media business, and has risen to become the number one distributor in Europe. It has also formed strategic alliances with numerous games and software publishers: Bethesda, Capcom, Kaspersky Labs, NC SOFT, Sega, Square Enix and Tecmo-Koei, etc. in various European countries. With Headquarters in Höfen, Austria Koch Media owns branches in Germany, England, France, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, the Nordic regions, Benelux, Australia, Czech Republic and the United States.
All product titles, publisher names, trademarks, artwork and associated imagery are trademarks, registered trademarks and/or copyright material of the respective owners. All rights reserved.
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punkrockpolitix · 3 years
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The House Always Wins
Hedge Funds routinely manipulate the market by using disinformation and institutional buying power to move perceived values in their favor, kneecapping corporations and putting hard-working employees on the street while they profit to the tune of billions. This week, the class of investors who are so often exploited in such cons struck back and the financial world went ape shit. 
To short a stock is to essentially place a bet that its value will drop between the time you take your position and a future date. You don’t even buy the stock. The investor simply borrows the shares, which they then sell at the current market price, betting that the stock’s trading price will decline and they can purchase shares at a lower cost before the borrowed shares must be returned.
Funds with billions of dollars in assets under their management can easily engineer wealth by taking short positions on a stock even if there is no reason to believe that the price is set to decline, so long as they can convince enough investors outside of their fund that it will. If you’re big enough, simply taking that position can lead to such speculation, while large, institutional investors can also influence markets simply by moving in and out of various stocks.
During the run-up to the financial collapse of the securitized debt market that helped spawn the Great Recession, many investment banks actually advised their clients to take the opposite position that they themselves were betting, enhancing their own odds at the expense of those paying the banks’ for financial advisory services. No, it was not illegal.
Increasingly, the ever-growing industry of financial news and analysis has been a platform in which large institutions create market movement in their favor. By sending a high-ranking executive onto MSNBC, CNBC, or Fox Business to give their insight to individual investors watching at home, these institutions can influence the confidence of less savvy and informed market participants.
These influences can actually cause market reaction to produce the result they’ve bet on. Once the price begins to drop, that becomes the new story and, as nervous investors who can’t afford to take a big loss get out, the price drops further, increasing the value of their short position. This happens ALL.THE.TIME. and no one cries foul. In fact, those who engineer such manipulation are routinely hailed as geniuses.
While technology has made it even easier for such big players to dominate the market, it’s also created opportunities for individual investors to mimic such tactics, guerilla-style. Smartphone applications and other digital trading technologies have decreased former barriers that slowed the movement of small investors while social media and other digital communication systems have allowed such investors to create real-time information clearinghouses that make them less reliant on antiquated and manipulative information sources like the financial media.
Founded in 2005, Reddit is a "social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion" website. It has a decidedly low-tech look and feel but has nonetheless grown into the 7th most visited website in the United States and 17th in the world. Subreddits exist for a mind-dizzying number of topics from the ordinary to the weird, to the truly disturbing.
Its look is similar to the pre-millennium chat rooms and message boards of early internet days. Users can upvote answers and contributions which push them higher in the feed, ensuring that what are thought to be the best answers, offerings or other contributions by the largest number of users are easiest to come by. Don't know if you should buy a certain year and model vehicle? There's a subreddit for that. Did you just watch a movie, not understand the point of the ending, and want to hear what others think? You can climb down a subreddit rabbit hole for hours.
WallStreeBets is a subreddit for investors who swap everything from tips to memes. Redditers there noticed that some very big hedge funds were taking short positions on GameStop, a chain of retail stores that mostly sells new and used video games. When users started pointing out that there was no reason to do so based on the company's financials they soon determined that it was garden variety market manipulation and began promoting a massive movement to buy GameStop shares in order to drive the price back up and foil their plans.
And did it ever work! The price of shares rose nearly 2000 percent, making some Reddit investors very, very rich in a matter of a day or two, as they dumped shares that had been purchased at the unnaturally low price for an overinflated one. This sort of "frontrunning," in which a price is driven up for investor benefit, is essentially the inverse of shorting it, though they were mostly working with purchased shares rather than ones that were borrowed (which is called a put option and would be the true opposite of a short).
This created billions and billions of dollars in exposure for some very wealthy and powerful people. The Redditers then went after other similarly positioned stocks. Soon, the entire financial news media was decrying the injustice done to the poor billionaires who were being fleeced by everyday people who, it is becoming increasingly clear, the financial markets aren't meant to benefit.
Robinhood is an app owned by financial services company Robinhood Markets Inc. Founded in 2013 by Vladimir Tenev and Baiju Bhatt, who had built high-frequency trading platforms for big financial institutions, its mission was said to be to "provide everyone with access to the financial markets, not just the wealthy." Let the People Trade was another early slogan.
However, while Robinhood, a free app, makes money from interest earned on its user's cash balances and margin lending, it also makes a lot of money selling user trading info to Wall Street (aka many of the people who are currently pissed) which led to the company suspending trading on GameStop and other targeted stocks on Thursday, freezing many of its users in poor positions. It turns out, they only want users to benefit if it doesn't interfere with the winnings of its real clients, the market manipulators who buy their user data so that they can more efficiently shake money from the pockets of the little guys.
When big firms make billions on speculation, there's always someone on the other end of that bet, or, in most cases, tens of thousands of people who don't have the ability to manipulate markets. The losers might be pension funds who've invested the money that's supposed to come back to employees at retirement or a middle-class worker whose 401k holds the wrong stocks. Not to mention the managers, employees, and others who are affected when a company is tanked for sport by the uber-rich.
It's hilarious to now watch those in the ivory towers—and the so-called financial journalists who shill for them—getting all worked up and actually call for the sort of regulation they so often fight tooth and nail against if it threatens to restrain their profits in the name of market stability or fairness. Where were the handsomely-paid talking heads when GameStop stock was falling for no other reason than an apex predator spotted it in the wild and decided it was hungry for a snack? Nowhere to be found because the people who butter their bread weren't making the phones ring, and they don't pick up when the number doesn't have a 212 area code.
Wall Street has become less and less about providing liquidity for markets so that the corporations that create American jobs can grow and prosper and more and more about setting up a rigged casino, in which the wales with three commas on their net worth always get dealt a hand that's superior to the tourists gambling with money that comes from wages rather than wealth. And when someone who's not in the club figures out a way to game the gamers just once? Well, that shit has to be stopped! Remember that the next time some politician points to the stock market as an expression of the American economy.
Like the yachts, boarding schools, lear jets, and palatial mansions, that shit ain’t for you, Jack. It’s for you to look at, to lust over, and to dream about so that you’re more willing to keep getting farmed for the benefit of the one percent and the promise that someday you too might get invited into the club (spoiler alert: you won’t). 
A long time ago, people who were good enough at organizing in their head what had transpired in a blackjack game to bet according to what they believed was most likely to happen started taking such skills to places like Atlantic City and Las Vegas. If they were lucky, they got thrown out and told to never come back, while their picture was circulated to every pit boss in town. The message was the same one Wall Street is now trying to send to those who want to play on an honest table: Fuck off, peon, haven’t you heard, the house always wins.
Mitch Maley (bio) is the editor of The Bradenton Times and host of the Punk Rock Politix Channel on YouTube. You can also listen to the Punk Rock Politix Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube and other platforms.
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customerservicewolf · 5 years
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Please note i’m not shaming this bunny for the Dolly Parton. He gets a glare for idly browsing and leaving her out on the coffee table display because Dolly is to be treated respectfully at all times, even in gift book format. 
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