Hundreds of protesters picketed Twitter’s offices because of an exceptionally generous tax break it receives from San Francisco. Meanwhile, municipal workers are being pressured to make concessions about their health care contributions because the city is running at a deficit.
In the San Francisco Bay Area in the past year there’s been a dramatic rise in anger directed at the tech industry, and activists have jumped on that discontent, organizing a new wave of anti-gentrification protests. In December and January, for instance, headlines were made as Google buses were blocked over tech’s significant contribution to displacement and the rising cost of living. Last Saturday housing organizers in San Francisco held a Citywide Tenants Convention to kick off an ambitious new agenda of legislative reform, aimed at curbing skyrocketing rents and ending a fast-growing number of evictions.
Wednesday was labor’s turn. SEIU Local 1021, which represents 13,000 city and county of San Francisco workers, brought out hundreds of its members to march on the headquarters of Twitter. The company was targeted because of an exceptionally generous tax break it receives from the city for locating its offices in the Mid-Market area. These tax breaks added up to $55 million in 2013 alone, according to the San Francisco Chronicle and are expected to be even greater this year. Meanwhile, Local 1021 says its members – city employees – are being pressured to make concessions at the bargaining table, most notably in the amount they have to contribute toward health care costs for them and their families, because the city is running at a deficit.
“As the city claims a deficit, corporations continue to get a free pass while services are being affected and unjustified health care costs are passed on to public and family budgets,” says Larry Bradshaw, vice president for SEIU Local 1021 and paramedic with the fire department.
Twitter is by no means the only large company, tech or otherwise, receiving tax breaks in San Francisco. Zynga, the maker of Facebook games such as FarmVille, received $6 million of tax breaks in 2011, according to the San Francisco Examiner. Several other companies such as Microsoft and Spotify are applying for their own exemptions. Twitter isn’t the only one, but it definitely has made itself a target.
We’re not backing down in the face of Trump’s threats.
As Donald Trump is inaugurated a second time, independent media organizations are faced with urgent mandates: Tell the truth more loudly than ever before. Do that work even as our standard modes of distribution (such as social media platforms) are being manipulated and curtailed by forces of fascist repression and ruthless capitalism. Do that work even as journalism and journalists face targeted attacks, including from the government itself. And do that work in community, never forgetting that we’re not shouting into a faceless void – we’re reaching out to real people amid a life-threatening political climate.
Our task is formidable, and it requires us to ground ourselves in our principles, remind ourselves of our utility, dig in and commit.
As a dizzying number of corporate news organizations – either through need or greed – rush to implement new ways to further monetize their content, and others acquiesce to Trump’s wishes, now is a time for movement media-makers to double down on community-first models.
At Truthout, we are reaffirming our commitments on this front: We won’t run ads or have a paywall because we believe that everyone should have access to information, and that access should exist without barriers and free of distractions from craven corporate interests. We recognize the implications for democracy when information-seekers click a link only to find the article trapped behind a paywall or buried on a page with dozens of invasive ads. The laws of capitalism dictate an unending increase in monetization, and much of the media simply follows those laws. Truthout and many of our peers are dedicating ourselves to following other paths – a commitment which feels vital in a moment when corporations are evermore overtly embedded in government.
Over 80 percent of Truthout‘s funding comes from small individual donations from our community of readers, and the remaining 20 percent comes from a handful of social justice-oriented foundations. Over a third of our total budget is supported by recurring monthly donors, many of whom give because they want to help us keep Truthout barrier-free for everyone.
You can help by giving today. Whether you can make a small monthly donation or a larger gift, Truthout only works with your support.