I'd like to know how many people think 'the corporation' is a good or bad thing for the average working person. Should we embrace them, or reject them, and why?
Corporations are not killing us, they are the most efficient model of business organization yet devised. What is hurting the world is the drive to enrich the executives at the expense of those at the lowest levels of the corporation.
They provide goods and services. That simple. Really, if you think the corporations and corporate greed is evil, don't look at the corporations - they just provide what the market wants (read: what the consumer wants). If corporations are ultra-evil like so many kooks suggest, then it's because Americans are ultra-evil. I seriously will never understand why you've got people in Abercrombie jeans, wearing Ugg boots, who drive brand new cars b**** and moan about corporate greed and the rich not paying their fair share. If you wonder what's wrong with America, don't look at corporations - they provide what the market desires. If people were more interested in helping the poor, what you'd actually see are corporations competing to provide the most good for the poor and needy at the lowest price (read: maximize effectiveness of charitable donations). But, despite being the most charitable nation in the world, that's not what you're seeing, because people are more interested in what they're wearing and what they drive than they are in their common man. That's why you see self-righteous liberals saying that the government needs to do this, do that for these people, not *I* need to do this or that for these people. They're concerned about their Abercrombie jeans, their Uggs, their new sound system, and their Burberry jacket and glasses. "Someone else" should be worried about charity, and these people will b**** up and down until they think "someone else" is doing enough about it.
"Business organization". That term has become a bit of a conundrum. I agree with your premise regarding the top tiers but, efficiency in making profit, doesn't necessarily equate to something good, and in fact, becomes the very worst motive.
Corporations are killing us? I work for a small corporation, as many Americans do, and not only has this corporation granted me an opportunity to work in the career of my choice at a good salary with benefits that I negotiated to my satisfaction with our owner, it has given others like me an opportunity to pool our similar talents and make more money for ourselves as the company grows. As with many corporations, it constitutes a group of people working together for their own individual and common benefit producing products and services that benefit our customers. Furthermore, the money we generate produces the tax revenue that the public needs to provide essential public/government services. I have little to no tolerance and respect for the cartoonish anti-corporate idiocy that exists on the neo-socialist Left these days. The federal government that these people are so enamored with is doing far more to kill us than corporations are.
I think you're right in most respects with this, though I do tend to believe that once a corporation is publicly owned, they cease to care what the general market wants and instead cater more toward their shareholders want. I got Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations for Christmas, and I was so excited to read it until I read the back of the book and remembered that it was a book that predated the Industrial Revolution. It wasn't until after the Industrial Revolution had started and was well underway that the modern corporation as we know it today came into being. Since that happened, I believe the classical model is outdated somewhat. Mind you, not entirely outdated, but outdated enough as to be not fully applicable.
Smith's principles are enduring, but there is a problem with corporations, one people today don't grapple with as well. Because of their public nature, many aren't as interested in long term profits. Family owned businesses are better for that, but the same people who hate corporations so much are the ones who created them. When you have large inheritance taxes, no limited liability for individual proprietorship, taxes more favorable to corporations, you're going to push out family businesses. These are the ones who will plant forests on their land because they know their children will inherit the wealth that grows on that land - you don't get that to the same extent with corporations, and its not because "corporations are evil blah blah blah," its because we've made a system that gives preference to them and pushes out single proprietorships.
I dont know if you can really call them good or evil they are neutral but I wonder what would you replace them with that could still serve us as well?
Until we completely overhaul the U. S. Tax Code to eliminate ALL loopholes, tax shelters, exclusions, and exemptions, there will never be economic justice among American citizens. Nobody -- including President Transparency, has seriously even tried to change the Tax Code, and he won't! "Limousine Liberals" like the Tax Code just as much as "Fat Cat Republicans". Everything else is just so much rhetoric and bull****. Corporations are "bad" if they make and sell products that are destructive and harmful. Many think that corporations like DuPont and Monsanto fit this description. But all corporations are really just clumps of people: investors, managers, and workers. I don't see that, as organizations, they are inherently "good" or "bad"....
Both of the examples you gave at the end of your post, constitute the worst of the corporation. Ones 'owns' seeds, and the other sells frying pans that cause cancer.
Corporations are harmless. The proof is you or I may reject or embrace them as we see fit. Take mcdonalds for example one of the largest and wealthiest corproations in the nation, and I never give them a dime. The reason is simple I do not like them. Corporations can take nothing from you period, they can only trade with you if you wish. Somehow the progressives who hate corporations so much always ignore that the government can and does harm and threaten people
My hate is a cultivation of all I have experienced and witnessed in my lifetime. It USED to be that the employer/employee 'relationship' was a valued commodity, but not anymore. Only quick and high volume 'profit' matters now, and not the people themselves. They don't 'provide' me with anything whatsoever. My own self provides me with what I have. When these profiteers start handing out everything for free, THEN yo can say 'they provide me'. They DO NOT. My labor does. Without labor, there is no profit, and the profiteers forget that basic premise. It's a dog eat dog, slit the other guys throat before your gets slit world, more than ever today. I suppose it always has been but, today, in this day and age, 'profit' is the only thing that seem to matter anymore, not the future of the people. Something's wrong with that picture, my friend.
Your opinions are probably based on the fact you never had a good paying job with a large corporation. If you had, you would understand the bigger the company, the better the pay and opportunities for advancement. Why do you want to keep the American worker down? Same reason Dems want to keep the blacks down... victims make the most loyal voters?
Yeah well. I can play the game if need be. I'm just tired of doing it. Believe whatever floats your boat though. Don't let me invade your fantasy.
I think one of the biggest ironies here is that no one exists within the belly of corporations more than those who live in cities, and it's city people who are more likely to be liberal. While in a sense this explains their beliefs, it's also quite pitiful because they have no intention of actually leaving city life. They don't see how the things they hate are fundamentally tied to the way that they live.
Does 'play the game' mean getting hired by a large corporation? I'm just saying... if you had ever worked for a large corporation, you wouldn't be so down on big business. Not being able to participate often makes us bitter against those who turned us down. There's no other obvious reason for your hatred for successful companies.
Huh? I live in the city and I've worked for both huge corporations and small mom & pop logistics companies -- and everything in between. To call me a liberal is to call the Pope a womanizer... it ain't happening. Somebody said earlier that corporations are nothing more than clumps of investors, mgmt. & workers or something to that effect.. but nothing could be further from the truth... FOR THE PEOPLE WHO WORK THERE. Company loyalty is both demanded and rewarded in large corporations. If you're not down with the mission, chances are you're not gonna get hired in the first place. The PEOPLE who work at Monsanto and DuPont aren't mad scientists out to ruin the earth. They're engineers and secretaries and purchasing managers and truck drivers and people who believe in their company. They go on company picnics and wear matching teeshirts with the company's name and play softball with the families of other employees. In return for their loyalty, the company pays them above average salaries, benefits, job security and upward mobility. So it's not just EVIL CORPORATIONS idiots from the left hate. They hate the fact that millions of Americans benefit from the success of big business.... but they don't get nuthin out of it. And on top of THAT the stupid govt gives those great employers TAX BREAKS to encourage them to hire more lucky people! If lefties get their way, we won't have a decent job left in America. We'll be like Germany... everybody makes $22/hr, payroll tax 49%, VAT tax 19%... and the country is close to bankruptcy. With all major US corporations relocated to different Caribbean Islands.
Pretty sad, glad I don't go through life hating people as you do. Mine sure value me, had some that did and then situations changed and they didn't anymore found another job when they no longer did. You make your own self valuable your employer has not obligation to value you if you are no longer of value to them. And you really don't know what you are talking about, most businesses who have that view do last very long, it is long term profitability that attracts investors. But give me some examples of these companies..........oh wait, you never back up your assertions with actual examples or numbers. They provide you with the products you cannot provide for yourself like the computer or tablet or phone you are using to access this forum unless you are going to try and claim you started out with basic raw materials and made it yourself. Tell me how you are going to provide for yourself when you retire, certainly you don't invest in these evil corporations in order to build your own wealth upon which to retire, so how are you going to do it? Where did the food you ate tonight come from, the clothes on your back, how about the TV you watch tonight, the care you drive, the medicines you take, you make all those yourself out of the resources in your back yard? They don't forget it, they calculate it everyday, your are and expense. No wonder you must not be very successful and allow yourself to be so abused. What's wrong with, it created the highest standard of living, the most wealth creation, the most security for the most people than anything in this world that has ever existed. You should get in on it.
