But last week, the Trump administration changed the ways that these benefactors could benefact. Now, instead of giving cash, donors can give shares of individual stocks, so long as they give the stock grants to groups of at least 5,000 kids in a given age group and geographic area. Moreover, the recipients cannot refuse the gift.

So, you begin to see the issue. Our tax dollars set up an account for kids and then "philanthropic" corporations add donations to those accounts in the form of stocks. now our tax dollars are tied up in these stocks

Note that the donors can target which kids get the money and THEY CANNOT REFUSE IT

You beginning to smell the problem???

Hey Elom Musk's space x is taking advantage of this donation, which is a tax write off

Of course, this stock thing is likely illegal

But here is where the corruption and scamming comes into play

You can't re--se the "donation" even if it means your kid has to hold the stocks of a nazi.

Or maybe you work in an industry that has actual ethics that prohibit owning stocks. Too bad. --

So, say a journalist who practices ethics and doesn't hold stocks now has his kid owning stocks in a company their parent is investigating.

But the worst part is the lockup period where you can't dump the stocks

Not only are families barred from rejecting donated shares at the outset, they are also prohibited from selling those unwanted shares, in most cases for at least five years.6

The best time for an executive to offload stock is when they think it's overvalued, and may soon drop.

So a company realizes its stock price is inflated, "donates" the stocks to kids, the kids cannot sell the stock while the stock price plummets

YAY capitalism

The corporation sees a tax windfall as the donation (i.e. tax write off) is on an inflated value

And in this case, the gift recipient is a captive audience, which may help set a sort of price floor on a falling stock. After all, some portion of the company's shares can't get dumped for a while, no matter how crappy the stock looks.

Its even worse

The donations, (since they can be targeted to specific communities) might be used to pressure recipients into doing things that are in the best interests of a corporation, and not necessarily the best interests of the public.

For example, let's say a company wants to build a data center in your area. That company might try to effectively bribe locals by stuffing cash into the Trump Accounts of the area's kids. Or, an executive might lobby Congress against some regulation or other, on the grounds that the policy will hurt profits"and therefore, punish the children in a given lawmaker's district. Deregulate our industry, Mr. Congressman! Please"it's for the children! Hell, maybe the parents in that district will whip votes on the company's behalf, too.

You think that is a joke

The text of the new regulation nakedly pledges as much: "Donors are attracted by the hope that a stock contribution with a five-year holding period may lead recipients and their families to feel that they have a stake in the fate of the corporation to a greater extent than if the child's holdings of the corporation were only through an index fun

EVERYTHING TRUMP TOUCHES DIES

EVERYTHING AND I MEAN EVERYTHING HE IS INVOLVED IN IS A SCAM

EVERYTHING