Continuing to Raise Awareness of Corporate Welfare

By Stephany Chung

Michael Pellagatti holding his sign in Bryant Park.

In Bryant Park, a short man with a stubble and a patch of turquoise-dyed curly hair was walking around in a blue poncho holding a small sign on May Day. This 24-year-old man, Michael Pellagatti – who was at the birth of Occupy Wall Street on September 17, 2011 – supported this movement until today; he continually stood against corporate welfare.

“Personally it [May Day] stood for people from all different backgrounds and occupations coming together and essentially fighting against corporate tyranny,” stated Pellagatti, an Occupy Wall Street TechOp.

In 2007, he had written an anti-war poem just for himself. When he was cleaning out his backpack, it was exposed next to him and when people read it, they misinterpreted the hypothetical situation and context of the poem and were “offended.”

“I had a bad personal experience was I was younger,” stated Pellagatti. “I got apprehended by authorities because I wrote some poetry that scared some people and that’s what clicked to my mind, which made me want to become a political activist.”

Back in high school, he was a “hard-core Republican.” However, after meeting various people such as, the Jersey City Council and anti-war activists, his ideas started changing.

From then onward, Pellagatti believed corporate welfare to be a “huge” problem.

Recently, he went on a “two year reading binge.” He read books, such as The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire and The Histories of Heradotus and these were some books that also affected his way of thought.

From his readings, he shared that according to a report of the Office of Government Accountability, the bankers launched their own private audit of the Federal Reserve.

“It turns out that the Federal Reserve secretly loans $16 trillion to these banks on Wall Street. $16 trillion,” Pellgatti emphasized.

The Federal Reserve directs the government to print more dollar bills, inflation occurs, and the American people have to pay more.  

He believes that the national debt is directly correlated to the greed of these bankers.

“I started raising this [the problem of corporate welfare] up and hopefully this will catch on soon,” stated Pellagatti. “I don’t think people know how big of a problem it is. They just brush it off.”