Corporate Fear

Intellectual property brings with it certain inherent rights. Ideas should be protected. Making money from your ideas is the American way. Companies pay employees for their ideas. Quite a bit of income is earned in the process. There is no harm in this until a better idea comes along to threaten a company's supremacy. Bad things occur when companies, seeing a threat to their bottom line, stand in the way of progress. Innovation is stifled and competition is eliminated. This should not be the way America does business.

Automobile manufacturers have fought for decades against more fuel-efficient vehicles. They have done their best to convince us that bigger is better. We have been more than willing to play along. The car has always been a status symbol. We love to thumb our collective noses at progress. Hummer owners especially are enamored with their suburban assault vehicles. Driving to the grocery store or dry cleaner is always fraught with danger!

Even when electric vehicles were being built most car makers were unhappy. Any threat to the "big 3's" dominance resulted, and still does, in increased lobbying efforts. Our environment never stood a chance against all of the money flowing to politicians. It should therefore be no surprise that the first electric cars were junked. Even now when some automakers work toward more fuel-efficient modes of transportation they are only throwing us the proverbial bone.

Cars will get more miles to the gallon. How many and how long it will take is the question. They will not become substantially better; better for the Earth or better for our pocketbooks. Auto makers and politicians will always be willing bedfellows. Let us not forget the energy companies. Oil, whether for our gas tanks or for our manufacturing processes, will be number one for many years to come. Alternative energy sources have a hard row to hoe.

King coal has been putting out a lot of propaganda as of late. Their commercials suggest that their product is a clean energy source. Who are they fooling? Coal is a dirty fuel, stripped from this planet in a dirty manner and fills our air and lungs with its dirty by-products. Ask any relative of a coal miner just what anthracite does to the human body. Black lung is a disease that kills.

I acknowledge that we need electricity. Coal is the predominant method in creating electricity. Power plants provide us the lifeblood we need to thrive and survive. Nuclear energy also offers a way to power our homes. There are alternative energy sources. Geothermal, wind and solar are much cleaner options for our various needs. As long as the big energy companies collude with our government we will be slaves to that which slowly kills us.

As I opined in an earlier post the drug companies do not always do right by their customers. Our lives, their length and our health all benefit from prescription drugs. They help us and heal us. What happens when a patent runs out? Other drug manufacturers have the right to create generic versions. They will be much more affordable. The original drug maker loses a source of funding. Sometimes they allow this to occur and concentrate on their new offerings. In other cases they fight tooth and nail to prevent the loss of their revenue stream.

Drug companies commonly use two methods to extend a drug's patent. In one scenario they use the courts. They convince a judge that there would be some type of harm if another company were to have access to their formula. The only real harm is to their bottom line. Another way, which is more common, is to create a new drug. The new drug will be chemically different from its predecessor. The problem is that the difference is minor. It is nearly identical from a medical standpoint yet different enough from a legal one.

Here is an example. Astrazeneca makes the drug Prilosec. This medication is now available over-the-counter. A new drug was waiting in the wings. The company wanted to hold on to their customer base so they created Nexium. Both drugs block acid. Both are for the treatment of gastroesophageal reflux disease or GERD. Nexium is billed as being even better than Prilosec as a course of treatment. Based upon my research the two drugs are almost chemically identical.

Drugs, transportation, energy sources or other staples of our existence cost money. There will always be companies that will sell them to us. We all know that progress in technology occurs over time. People manage to find a way to do it better though not always cheaper. Progress is stifled when greedy companies stand in the way. Fear of losing money cannot be the only motivation of corporate life. Survival of the fittest refers not just to man but also to business. If leaders of industry want to survive then I suggest this simple mantra: Innovate rather than stagnate.