I keep saying it, so maybe I should make a meme of it:
The key ingredient for data centers in the US is not an abundance of water and power, but cheap, bribeable regional officials.
this post was submitted on 10 Jun 2026
915 points (99.1% liked)
Work Reform
16546 readers
1188 users here now
A place to discuss positive changes that can make work more equitable, and to vent about current practices. We are NOT against work; we just want the fruits of our labor to be recognized better.
Our Philosophies:
- All workers must be paid a living wage for their labor.
- Income inequality is the main cause of lower living standards.
- Workers must join together and fight back for what is rightfully theirs.
- We must not be divided and conquered. Workers gain the most when they focus on unifying issues.
Our Goals
- Higher wages for underpaid workers.
- Better worker representation, including but not limited to unions.
- Better and fewer working hours.
- Stimulating a massive wave of worker organizing in the United States and beyond.
- Organizing and supporting political causes and campaigns that put workers first.
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
"We need term limits" lol. Term limits mean politicians need to line their pockets even faster. Fucking Rome was famous for this shit.
What we really need to do is hold corrupt politicians and the businesses that are paying them accountable for 150% of the damages from their schemes. None of this "I took a 5 million dollar bribe and I got 6 months house arrest plus a 1500 dollar fine."
It's Corruption all the way up.
its a plus if they can get the governer to be bribed, which is what happened with whitmer and janet mills. they made sure those datacenters are approved.
I mean, we get lots of tax breaks, they're just highly dependent on increasingly arcane rulesets that are ever-changing and still designed to keep you on the edge of poverty. And then they're paid for with higher taxes in years following.
If you're a "company" you get to offset money coming in with expenses and even in the most honest of systems only pay tax on the difference (i.e. the profits).
If you're an "individual" you pay taxes on any money coming in and cannot offset it with expenses.
So even at the structural level the system is designed to be incredibly unfair. That shit you describe is just adding insult to injury.
If you're a "company" you get to offset money coming in with expenses and even in the most honest of systems only pay tax on the difference (i.e. the profits).
Taxing profits instead of revenue is sensible though, otherwise businesses with low profit margins would be impossible to run. Groceries would be twice as expensive since the supermarket would have to increase their profit margin by a huge amount to not go bankrupt
Why do they need a huge profit margin of profit is the money left over after they’ve paid their expenses? And why wouldn’t you want the same system for individuals?
load more comments
(1 replies)
Hmm maybe this indicates that basic necessities of life should not be managed through the profit motive.
load more comments
(3 replies)
load more comments
(2 replies)
Because you voted your way into this
Technically people didn't vote their way into this if we are to believe the second election was rigged... but that doesn't matter now does it
load more comments
(6 replies)
Why? Because the alternative will lead to people watching their loved ones get hurt or die. People are used to a peaceful existence for the most part, and particularly in the US, food and medicine being regularly available.
If we have to shoot our way out, many will pay a grave cost. I'm not saying it's not a potential outcome, and if it comes to that, it is what it is, but I don't blame people for wanting to find any alternative that doesn't involve the complete social collapse of a civilization.
Multilateral approaches to revolution are statistically way more successful. Meaning there have to be multiple factions but usually some use force or threat of force to back up the peaceful majority. Thems be the facts
Obviously a violent approach shouldn’t be chosen first or lightly or at all if possible—but that doesn’t mean people can’t and shouldn’t start taking steps to defend themselves from illegal violence from the ruling class.
People right now can learn how to operate, maintain and store firearms safely. People right now can form militias and community defense groups as a deterrence from the ruling class violence.
None of that have to mean performing acts of violence, but can help us have a stronger position to bargain in the future.
Well if fighting is too high a cost then you could just live with and just accept the new order and probably live a completely normalish life assuming climate collapse isn't as bad as projected.
Which I'm afraid is what most people will end up doing.
Genuine questions: then what is the solution and how have you contributed to it?
Genuine answer: organizing with your fellow people, and forming communities. It's not an accident that seems such a monumental task today when historically it was the only reason people survived hardship.
load more comments
(5 replies)
Rich ppl are a threat to civilization and need to be significantly disempowered.
Head removal sounds like an appropriate debuff
It's time to take back our world
Thanks for the red, squiggly underline. I'm recovering from my fifth lobotomy this week, and it really aids comprehension.
Politicians should get no peace. No taking out the garbage, no going out to eat, none of it without a mob screaming in their faces 24/7.
The splatter of a lobbed turd in a paper bag is an effective means of expressing dissatisfaction.
Well, that's because they create jobs.
Oh ,wait.
The last figure I saw for some Ohio data center was $15 million in tax breaks for 10 jobs. At this rate, give 10 random people in Ohio $1.5 million. That would help the economy much more.
To be fair that's how it worked for a long time but government is slow and doesn't adapt and in some ways it's rigged to stay the same.
Corporate socialism for me, not for thee!
I should save this for the next time I see “billionaires pay more tax than you”.
Ohio is the upper Midwest Mississippi
Maybe tax breaks should have to be passed via referendum
Ohio is a magat shithole may they get everything they voted for
Funny enough, most states aren't MAGA. Even Texas.
Gerrymandering and fucking with votes is how conservatives have been in power.
Yeah I fled ohio last year and it's infamously gerrymandered. The state legislature dgaf what anyone thinks about issues
People get lots of tax breaks. But tax breaks are helpful proportional to your tax debt.
A 10% tax reduction on $1000 is a pittance compared to $1M
load more comments
(1 replies)
Thanks Obama..
I have fantasies that some day we may hunt billionaires (and anyone who refuses to abandon the wealth) much the way we hunted escaped high-ranking Nazis after WWII.
We're going to need to collectively get really mad for this to happen, though since whenever someone does a socialism the capitalists get aggressive, so a rising socialist civilization emerging from the ashes of empire might go after the ultra-wealthy as a pre-emptive defensive measure.
For now it's all just blue-sky fantasy, though.
Even if you look at it through a pure numbers view, places that do this are dumb. Data centers have a figurative two people working in them. They are not getting paid enough and spending enough to cover the tax loss of the kind of cuts they are offering the company to get them.
view more: next ›