I never said we can't condemn the behavior of businesses.
The prime objective for a business is to make money. All the ethics, right/wrongs, etc are things that we expect from the people who run those businesses. But the business is there to make money.
It is up to the people in charge of making choices for society to make the right choices. It's not the responsibility of the business. They have every right to lobby for anything they want.
"The prime objective for a business is to make money."
A business is a way for people to organize and collaborate and it does not absolve those people of their moral and ethical obligations. Individuals are expected to prioritize family, community, country, religion, etc. We need to stop giving people a free pass just because they hide behind articles of incorporation.
Hold the people who have made you promises and then failed to follow through responsible. Aka, your politicians. They are your backstop. What makes Goldman, GSK, Haliburton, or any of the other shady, scummy businesses out there responsible to you? They are responsible to the law on the books.
Our politicians are supposed to prevent business from screwing our society. Stop giving them an out. They failed, time and time again.
I think it could work really well to put businesses "in jail." You can't physically put them in prison, but you can achieve the same ultimate effect by forcing them to cease operations for a period of time. If a crime would put a person in prison for five years, then maybe it should also force a business to cease operations for five years.
It was, because you can't put a business in actual jail... You gave an alternative punishment that you could actually levy on a business and I agree that that could work.
Everyone in a society has an obligation to that society. America seems to be forgetting this. A business doesn't change the obligations of the individuals so put the individuals in prison if needed. Did someone sign off on dumping toxic waste or robbing people's savings? Would have been illegal if a person did it without getting a paycheck? Why does a paycheck change anything? Let them answer for their actions.
> Everyone in a society has an obligation to that society.
You're right, every person does.
> A business doesn't change the obligations of the individuals so put the individuals in prison if needed. Did someone sign off on dumping toxic waste or robbing people's savings? Would have been illegal if a person did it without getting a paycheck? Why does a paycheck change anything? Let them answer for their actions.
What are you trying to say here? That we should hold people/businesses legally responsible? No one is arguing against that.
The charter granted to the business can contain clauses requiring the business to attend to more than just its own returns.
The state or the people grant that charter to the business, with the benefits its confers regarding liability and taxation, so we could decide to do so only if the business commits to the terms.
There's no inalienable right to incorporation in the US constitution - the corporation is a statutory fiction we've all agreed to use.
If Company A wanted to lobby for the killing of all blue eyes babies, they could. They can make signs, start campaigns, attempt to get a meeting with a member of Congress.
All of that lobbying would be useless though because we all know that that idea is disgusting and wrong (hopefully we all know... with this current climate, nothing is certain).
The act of killing the babies is wrong, and we can pretty much all agree on that. But that company has every right to lobby for that position. No matter how crazy.
> They may have the legal right to do so, but it's still wrong in some cases.
I fully understand the distinction, and I think you're the one conflating two different things. How exactly am I supposed to interpret "wrong" in your original comment? Without context, that usually refers to morality, not legality. Furthermore, you used the word "wrong" a second time to describe elected officials going against the public interest, which is legally right. I see no way to read your original comment other than saying it is not morally wrong for businesses to lobby in this way.
But then afterwards you concentrate entirely on legality. If you just wanted to say that it's legal for businesses to lobby like this, I don't disagree, but I don't see how that position is described in the original comment, nor do I even understand the point of making that comment, since I think we all already know that it's legal.
If you did indeed mean to say that it's legally allowed but morally reprehensible, then we are indeed in agreement and I don't think there's much to say here.
> The act of killing the babies is wrong, and we can pretty much all agree on that. But that company has every right to lobby for that position. No matter how crazy.
No one is saying they don't have that legal right; they're saying that "legal" doesn't imply "ethical".
Consider Company A's lobbying efforts succeed and people start killing blue-eyed babies. Even if Company A never kills a baby, they still did something unethical, since there's a causal relationship between their lobbying efforts and a thing we just agreed was wrong.
What's laughable? You can choose which businesses you want to interact with anytime you want, and if you don't like their policies, choose someone else.
While you can "choose" a politician, you get whoever the group chose for 2-6 years. Don't like your president or their morals? Deal with it until the next round of choice.
I think that imbalance in individual authority and power gives everyone the right to hold public and private individuals to different standards.
With all due respect, "the group" decides what I can buy just as much as they decide who represents me.
Remember the time when there was a single phone out that combined flagship performance with a size that fits comfortably in one hand? Or the time when laptop manufacturers included PgUp/PgDown/Home/End keys instead of hiding all of those behind a Fn key? Or the time when I could use the internet without being tracked by every single competitor? Good luck avoiding Facebook or Google Docs when your charity has bought into those for communication?
The businesses everyone's fawning about are also the businesses who have best figured out protection from customer choice by employing lock-in and network effects. That's not choice, that's rule by moat.
Customer choice is for suckers. When a flood of ads and convenience can lure the masses, who would even pay attention to the few idiots who vote with their wallets or think of long-term market implications?
My wallet has no more effect on product availability than my vote has on the politician who represents me and what policies they support.
>What's laughable? You can choose which businesses you want to interact with anytime you want, and if you don't like their policies, choose someone else.
You try to exercise your consumer rights next time you're in a hospital, or something unforeseen occurs, or you're subject to a telecom monopoly, etc... etc...
Your way of thinking only works in a perfect fiction that has never and will never exist, except as a sop to some egos.
Business aren't actually people, they are fictions. Your judgement doesn't appeal to their consciences or affect their senses of self-worth. They don't have hearts. Strategies appealing to their better natures are doomed to fail.
The prime objective for a business is to make money. All the ethics, right/wrongs, etc are things that we expect from the people who run those businesses. But the business is there to make money.
It is up to the people in charge of making choices for society to make the right choices. It's not the responsibility of the business. They have every right to lobby for anything they want.