Corporate welfare is a sociological concept that analogizes corporate subsidies to welfare payments for the poor. The term is often used derogatorily to describe a government's bestowal of money grants, tax breaks, or other special favorable treatment on corporations or selected corporations, and implies that corporations are much less needy of such treatment than the poor. In practice, the term is often used virtually interchangeably with crony capitalism. To the extent that there is a distinction, the latter term could be considered broader, including all types of governmental decisions that favor the "cronies" (big businesses and industry groups providing substantial campaign contributions), while corporate welfare might be restricted only to direct government subsidies.
Read more about Corporate Welfare: History
Famous quotes containing the words corporate and/or welfare:
“Power, in Case’s world, meant corporate power. The zaibatsus, the multinationals ..., had ... attained a kind of immortality. You couldn’t kill a zaibatsu by assassinating a dozen key executives; there were others waiting to step up the ladder; assume the vacated position, access the vast banks of corporate memory.”
—William Gibson (b. 1948)
“You can’t talk about a kind of democracy unless those who are affected by decisions make those decisions whether the institutions in question be the welfare department, the university, the factory, the farm, the neighborhood, the country.”
—Casey Hayden (b. c. 1940)