Why are some people so distrustful of corporations?

[kentuck]

Especially those that have shipped a lot of jobs overseas?

Does just the fact of them being just a "corporation" mean they are not trustworthy??

This puzzles me. I'm trying to figure it out.

***

[House of Roberts]

1. Some corporations put profits above the welfare of their customers.

The laws regulating corporations do not adequately identify the culpable party in such cases, allowing the guilty to escape justice.

[jwirr]

5. And their profits are placed above their workers.

[lumberjack_jeff]

2. Distrustful? Not me.

I know that they will do exactly what they promise to do. Maximize quarterly shareholder return.

That's the only thing they promise to do - everything else is tactics.

[Major Nikon]

18. Which is the exact same thing virtually every other business does

The difference being profits are distributed by something other than a share structure.

That's why unions are so important. Absent family wage laws, it's really the only practical way workers are going to get any more than the minimum it takes to operate the business.

[kentuck]

20. Amen to that!

I honestly do not know if it is possible to organize as we might have done in the past?

[lumberjack_jeff]

33. I agree that unions are important, but a corporation is different than business.

A corporation is an artificial entity without any human attributes other than a designed-in quest for shareholder return.

The craftsman running his sole proprietorship does so for a variety of sometimes conflicting human reasons.

[kentuck]

34. I would agree.

[Major Nikon]

36. I disagree

If you take two companies the same size, where one is a corporation and one is not, you typically have far more human attributes with the corporation. You have a whole network of human attributes including board members and executives which are answerable to the stockholders. Some corporations are even employee owned and certainly have far more human attributes than any sole proprietorships. Certainly many corporations have zero interest other than profit motives, but that's pretty much the same for any other profit distribution structure, including sole proprietorship and in that instance you only have one person who is only answerable to one individual. Corporations also typically have a host of employee benefits for many or all employees like a retirement plan and healthcare. Sole proprietorships generally don't. Sole proprietorships that only have a few employees are also exempt from many laws which insure safety and fairness of the employees. Corporations are also more likely to have unions, which create far more human attributes.

[lumberjack_jeff]

37. Your argument requires accepting the premise that the more individuals involved in an organization

... the more likely it is that the organization will exhibit human attributes such as compassion, judgment, fairness and morality.

YMMV. In my experience, I'd say the opposite is true and that there's an inverse relationship. I'd much rather make a moral plea to an individual rather than a committee.

[Major Nikon]

38. I'm saying that when you compare apples to apples, that much is true

You are comparing a very small business model with a large one, which really has little to do with profit distribution other than the corporation tends to be more efficient in growth. Certainly there are large companies which aren't publicly offered which have the same lack of human attributes you describe. The difference is they are not as widely accountable. So while the corporate accountability structure may not have all that much to offer in that regard, it's still better than a same sized company with all the power in the hands of very few and less accountability. Look at Hobby Lobby and Chick-fil-A. Although they have some sort of corporate structure, they have no public offerings and are basically accountable to nobody other than a very small network of people. As such they can much more easily get away with all sorts of assholery. Those at the very top have absolutely no fear of getting fired. This isn't true of publicly offered corporations where even founders can be bounced.

With any for profit enterprise, there's always the possibility of those in charge holding profit far above any other considerations. That's why we need laws to regulate them and unions to protect employee interests.

[notadmblnd]

3. I think most have pretty much shown that they are some greedy bastards

who'd slit their own mother's throats in their pursuit of money

[rogerashton]

4. I'm not sure it is a matter of "trust," but

1) For-profit corporations are required to maximize their profits. If they limit profits in order to do good, the shareholders can sue them. (There are a few exceptions, and this depends on state law in the US, but is the general case.)

2) By aggregating capital, corporations become very powerful, and even if 1) were not the case, power corrupts. That's why we democrats want to have power responsible to the people through democratic processes.

3) "Shareholder democracy" is a sham. Even if it were real, it would not be democracy, since the shareholders are a privileged class, not representative of "the people." But aside from that, the only shareholders who have any influence over corporate power are very large shareholders -- billionaires or trust managers.

4) For what it is worth, real free market advocates despise corporations. Adam Smith said "It would not be reasonable to create a corporation." Some Austrian economists reject corporations as instruments of the state.

I'm tempted to say -- what is there to like about corporations? But, in fact, we need to mobilize very large lumps of capital, and the only two agencies capable of that are corporations and the state. Corporations may be the lesser evil. But they need to be civilized, and that is an unsolved problem.

[Jackpine Radical]

7. There's nothing wrong with state-run banks.

North Dakota has had one for well over a century, along with state grain elevators. These are the remains of the "prairie populism" of that era.

[moondust]

8. "we need to mobilize very large lumps of capital"?

Why?

[1StrongBlackMan]

9. +1 ... Somebody actually learned something in Econ and B-structures. n/t

[Hoyt]

12. Actually, there is no legal requirement to maximize profits.

Many attempt that, but they can do all kinds of good stuff.

One can sue a corporation for just about anything, winning is another matter .

I do believe we need more socially conscious managers.

[1StrongBlackMan]

6. Who, in the Democratic Party is trustful of corporations? ...

The fact is, in our current system, corporations are a necessary evil and must be regulated, closely. I doubt there is a Democrat, that is connected to reality) that differs on that point.

[Hoyt]

13. +1. We do need to reward corporations for "doing the right stuff."

[1StrongBlackMan]

14. And punish them when they don't ...

That is what has me so excited about Patrick Duval's move to Bain ... he's changing the game!

[Hoyt]

15. Agreed. I've had several people call me all kinds of names

for posting that Patrick had a very different role at Bain than Romney and most others.

We ought to be cheering for him, and encouraging others to do the same.

[ananda]

10. Corporatism will bring whole societies down into dystopia.

It's too impersonal, like a machine juggernaut that mows down
anything and anyone that gets in the way of its sucking profits
from every possible source even if that means draining the
planet of its ability to support life.

The collective psyche behind this is in bad shape and individual
psyches writ smaller. Only a metanoia on both levels will make
a difference, and we are ALL subject to this, whatever side of
the extremism spectrum we are on.

When chaos and dystopia reach a tipping point, there will be a
huge change... and this could mean the end of humanity on
earth, though I would certainly prefer a happier solution first.

I've been reading up on Jung's idea of the enantiodromia, a
process which I believe is operating now in a huge, intense
way. Jung always saw this as a good, positive process, while
he also saw the negative potential as well if balance is not
achieved.

[kentuck]

21. Interesting.

Thx!

[Freelancer]

11. It's the distrust of the two-way mirror

It's about transparency and reach.

With each passing year, corporations demand to know more and more about us, they demand the right to surveil us, to monitor our transactions and even probe what we think by mining our interactions on social media. At the same time, corporations demand greater and greater opacity and rights for themselves. Everyone suspects that they could severely mess with our individual little lives if they chose. Meanwhile, every automated "your call is important to us" is a reminder of just how unreachable they are to us. How could we possibly trust them?

[eridani]

16. REal people are not potentially immortal n/t

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

17. I do trust them....to wring every buck out of the public they can.

I trust them to try and get us to bail them out when they get in trouble.

I trust them to bribe (..donate) politicians to do their bidding and bail them out.

I trust them to hire lawyers to get court decisions in their favor.


I trust them to be capitalists.

[randome]

19. Sometimes the language we use regarding corporations troubles me.

We say corporations are not people, and I wholeheartedly agree they are not.

But we fall into the routine of speaking of them as if they are. "Corporation A is greedy." "Corporation H keeps off-shoring jobs."

There are people making these decisions and I wish we could more readily call out these individuals for their abuses. But corporations are deliberately structured for plausible deniability.

I just wish we could somehow get in the habit of calling out CEO Jacobs (or whatever) instead of referring to a corporation by name because corporations are only composed of paper and cannot be responsible. A CEO can.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]"There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in."
Leonard Cohen, Anthem (1992)[/center][/font][hr]

[kentuck]

23. So corporations are people?

Mitt Romney was right??

[MADem]

28. You're right--if CEO's knew that THEY, personally, would be challenged

they might not be so eager to be such assholes.

[woo me with science]

22. People have a problem with corporations purchasing GOVERNMENTS.

There's a fundamental problem in that.

Corporations exist to grow their own profit. Governments are supposed to exist for the welfare of human beings.

When you put corporate motives in charge of governments, terrible things happen to people.

[Exilednight]

31. The more fundamental problem is how the right

Speaks of capitalism as if it's a form of government, and not what it really is - an economic system.

[kentuck]

35. We need more people to get involved and run for office...

...and defeat those corporate whores, you think?

[bobjacksonk2832]

24. Because most of them only care about profits

They don't care if their products make people sick, or the quality is poor. I'm sure they envy the good old days when government regulation was nonexistent.

[War Horse]

25. Dunno if this is tongue in cheek or not...

But precisely because they have shipped a lot of jobs overseas, perhaps?

I spent a lot of years working for a large multinational corp. With each buy-out and takeover everything got more and more cut-throat about the business model. A company that once proudly delivered the best quality possible became one that was obsessed with delivering quality that was just "good enough" that their clients would accept it, and thus cutting costs on every corner imaginable.

And many of those clients were actually other huge multinationals, by the way.

What's more, the more cynical the corp got, the more often we had to sit through what I can only describe as "loyalty sessions". Someone in upper management from New York, Mumbai or wherever would deliver these conference call sessions espousing the awesomeness of the company, how we all needed to contribute to make the company "win at everything" etc. etc.

This was, of course, combined with ever increasing amounts of individual audits everyone from account managers down to project coordinators had to suffer through, even at the most local levels.

It all went hand in hand with the old story: We had a firmly established group of West European vendors that we'd built up a relationship with for years. Then a whole bunch of so-called 'low cost' sites were set up in East Europe that we absolutely had to use. Heaven forbid you used any of the 'old' vendors, even to get a project finished on time and to ensure customer satisfaction, because red flags would go off all over the place if you even issued a purchase order to the 'wrong' type of vendor. (Every system we used, for every single task, was globally interlinked, of course).

Not long thereafter we were chastised for still using the East Europe sites. Because we had, of course, established sites that were even more low cost in India. Sites that were later on, at least in part, sold down the river because it was much more cost effective to have more things done in China. It's an old story by now, it's basically how the world works these days. For better and for worse.

So the reason why I'm distrustful of (many) corporations, especially the huge, multinational ones, is because I spent many years in the belly of the beast, as it were.

Sorry about the rant

[cantbeserious]

26. The Oligarchs, Corporations And Banks Own And Control The Politicians And Media That Own And Control Us

Really Simple To Understand.

[MADem]

27. You kinda answered your own question, but there's history of betrayal in the mix.

A lot of young people just "hate corporations" because they're greedy, soulless, looking for the money, everything for the CEOs and members of the Board type outfits.

A lot of OLDER people remember corporations as places where, if you got a job and did well, you'd get stock options, a pension, a secure job through retirement, and enough in your paypacket to support a family on a single salary--that's where the BETRAYAL comes in. They didn't just ship those jobs overseas for shits and giggles, they did it because they wanted more money in PROFIT for the corporate bosses and the shareholders. They disregarded the relationship between the company and the workers entirely--and in doing what they did, they devalued the workers.

The corporations had an implied contract with the American worker, and they sacrificed that contract for filthy lucre.

That's why people dislike them--that implied contract, they reneged upon it. No one likes a rip-off artist, no one likes a con man, no one likes someone who makes a deal and then reneges upon it. They didn't even give them a tender kiss upon the cheek before they booted those workers out the door. It was a nasty thing they did, many of them.

[AZ Progressive]

40. Jack Welch tore the social contract into pieces and the rest of the corporate world followed him...

The corporate world has never been the same since.

[MADem]

44. BINGO! He is the face of Corporate Assholishness, certainly! An evil man.

Tim Russert was an everyday schlub, a champion of the "working man," who wrote a touching book (and then another, and another--churning them out like Father's Day cards from Hallmark) about his hard working, 'regular guy' daddy (he never said shit about his hard-working mother--a telling failing, IMO, but never mind that).

Then Jack Welch got ahold of him, and next thing you know, he's wearing a BUSH button on the backside of his lapel at the Al Smith dinner, buying the yacht and the mansion on the Vineyard, sending that turdy kid to once Dem/now shitstain-GOP Boston College, eating steak and farting through silk. Of course, then he had a massive coronary at the tender age of 58, no doubt from the stress of the betrayal of his own values coupled with too much rich food, and he didn't get to enjoy the fruits of his perfidy and greed....but that's what happens when you take a weak-minded fellow like Timmy, promise him great wealth and power, and entice him to stray from the solid, honest, hard-working path of his forebears.

Welch bought his soul, and bought it cheaply, too. He and his pals, Cheney, et. al., used that fool like the low-rent tool he was, broke him, and moved on with scarcely a care--they did give his stupid "Waaah, Nancy Pelosi is an OLD LAAAAADY" (shades of Jerry Lewis) kid a gig at the network, probably to shut him up and draw him into the fold so he wouldn't ask too many questions--it's hard to speak out or be critical when you have your hand in the dog's mouth. He's not going to risk his paycheck and get bitten for his trouble, at least not any time soon.

[99Forever]

29. It's amazing!!!, huh?

[Jacoby365]

30. Why are some people so distrustful of corporations?

Some of the largest corporations that operate in the United States lie, cheat, steal, and some even kill, all for profits. I'm an ordinary citizen, and I have been victimized on many occasions. I'm sure every person that posts on this forum is a victim of crimes by corporations. What is sad, is that apparently not everyone realizes they are being victimized.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

32. For me, it's simple. Despite what Mitt Romney thinks, corporations are not people.

They're not bound by the same laws as the rest of us, and are able to do all sorts of immoral and unethical things without much worry, because for the most part, even if one part of the populace is willing to boycott them over something they do, a different part will turn around and support them specifically BECAUSE they do such things. They generally have the power to hurt human beings, and the bigger they are, the more people they can hurt, and there's no real criminal recourse for doing such things. You can't put a corporation in prison, you can't give it the death penalty. All you can do is take money from it, and most of the time, that just means it raises the amount it charges customers or do something else sleazy that will make it more money than will be taken away if it gets caught, leaving the corporation unhurt.

[AZ Progressive]

39. Corporations are money making machines of the rich, and are often highly reckless....

in terms of destroying small businesses, mistreating workers and paying them unfairly, poorly serving customers, and damaging the environment, as well as engage in corruption and corrupt politicians with money.

Many corporations seem to be run by sociopathic people that put profits over everything else. It takes a principled CEO to make a corporation successful nowadays while sticking to their mission and without succumbing to temptation in going to the dark side...

[AZ Progressive]

41. Maybe you need to see this...

[OilemFirchen]

42. What the fuck is this thread about?

Corporations are legal fictions designed to protect the owners and employees from liability and debt. Econ 101 - the easiest part.

I was the CEO of a privately-held corporation founded in 1983. At its zenith, there were five stakeholders and seven employees, including two of the stakeholders. I was also CFO of another privately-held corporation which functioned as an umbrella for future development. That corporation had no employees and did no business.

What meme was I?

[PRB]

43. A company is different from an individual

A company is different from an individual. An individual has to look you in the eye when bearing bad news. Or at least that is often some interaction with a person. If an individual from a company bears bad news, then they can blame in on the company. Like higher-ups or policy. It's easier to screw people when you don't have to look them in the eye. You also have that protection in numbers. You can hide behind the company legal term or PR person. I know that some PR people make a lot of money. Especially the representatives that appear on TV. Some are really ruthless.

[JDPriestly]

45. A corporation is simply a business form that is created when certain papers are filed

in a government office.
Thus, in my opinion, a corporation is created by the government permitting a group of people to call themselves a corporation.

Corporations are formed because they permit those who own or invest in the corporation to limit the amount of their liability or indebtedness for damages they cause or debts they incur in the name of the corporation to their investment in the corporation. If you buy stocks in a corporation or own stocks in a corporation, you are not liable for debts of the corporation beyond the investment you made. That's a slightly inaccurate but good enough explanation of what a corporation is.
bec
The corporate form permits business owners to control the amount of risk they take when they invest in their business. That form is also good for encouraging people to make passive investments in projects or businesses they like or believe will be profitable. That means that they can invest money in the corporation but not have to be involved at every step or even at some steps in the management of the company.

There are other business forms that permit an investor to limit his risk.

Thus corporations can be great for the economy because they allow people to put up money to run or start a company and still control the risk to the rest of their wealth.

The reasons we talk so negatively sometimes about corporations are that 1) corporations can be socially utterly insensitive; 2) corporations can and often do put profit before considerations of the greatest or even any social good; 3) the Supreme Court has decided that corporations have the same human rights as real humans and that is obviously not true and socially unacceptable; 4) corporations can and often are downright irresponsible because the owners' liability for the damage they cause can be limited to the assets of the corporation. There are lots of situations in which corporations can be held responsible for damages, etc. they cause, but I am trying to keep this simple, and somehow the perception is strong that corporations seem to be less likely to be held responsible than ordinary people are.

But our society needs corporations. We need, however, to change our laws so that corporations become more responsible socially.

And we need to encourage more partnerships and cooperative enterprises. Maybe we could work on some ways to limit liability without causing social harm with regard to all these organizational forms for businesses.

It's the perception of the callous disregard for human values (a result of the limited liability and irresponsibility with regard to society in general of many corporations) that is prevalent in so many corporations that causes people to generalize and think of corporations as bad.