We live in an age of catastrophic corporate control that threatens our democracy. Large corporations buy elections, lobby politicians, evade taxes, manipulate schools, and deceive the public to serve shareholder profit and greed. They sell us a win-win, but the only winners are elites at the top of the corporate pyramid scheme. This is the reason that housing is unaffordable, medical care is a leading cause of bankruptcy, the fraction of young adults who own a business has fallen by two-thirds since the 1980s, and one-quarter as many people trust the government as did in the 1960s.

I am not ideologically opposed to economic development or resource extraction. But I do oppose the invasion of our community by a multinational corporation. Most Haines businesses are owned by local people who eat and drink from our watershed. But James Garfield MacVeigh, Hiroshi Kinoshita, and their horde of foreign investors are not local people. They are headquartered in Vancouver, B.C., and affiliated with huge corporations operating everywhere except Antarctica. Their byzantine network of shell companies and private equity firms is promising us jobs and economic revitalization. But the profits will go to them and their financiers, while our workers and citizens are relentlessly squeezed and exploited. This will further erode the accountability of public servants to our residents, and the ability for most of us to live a dignified life in Haines.

Do these wealthy globalists deserve to run Haines? And possibly ruin it forever?

Arjun Raman

Author