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Corporate Greed
- Thread starter BigRob
- Start date
Werbung:
Where do you draw the line between building the proverbial mousetrap and monopoly ?
If a company is not doing anything illegal to prevent competition - what is wrong with a company that simply took over the market in a certain sector?
pocketfullofshells
Well-Known Member
So was Slavery bad? was it a bad thing that Slave owners wanted to keep their slaves? After all if it is done to maximize profit then its ok right?
Just maxing out profits at any cost is not a moral argument to do what ever you want and treat your workers how ever you want, or even your customers.
Child labor is cheap, so is Prison labor in China, sweatshops make good money, Drug Dealers also try to maximize profits, so do Pimps. The Catholic church maxed profits by hiding sex abuse claims as long as they could.
Lots of Very rich people maxed Profits in the Great Depression, the banking collapse of 2008, was just maxing profits...
Also your idea of, well if its not illegal...what if it was illegal but they just bought and paid people to change the law for them? also does legal = moral?
Slavery was more a case of protecting fixed assets not maximizing profit.
Employing cotton gins would maximize profit as they are more efficient. If fixed assets disappear then the balance sheet is impacted which harms the company. Walk into the Chevy plant and magically disappeat production lines and you harm the company.
So making money and employing people is immorality but murdering babies is moral in your world ? Interesting.
pocketfullofshells
Well-Known Member
I did not say making money or employing people was immoral, I said that doing anything to make more money is not moral. and also dead babies taste good with BBQ
Make more $ employ more people and make even more $.
Then eat what you kill.
pocketfullofshells
Well-Known Member
I hire 10 year olds and pay them a buck a hour, makes me a ton of money, yay ethics! because I made more money, its ok
I go to PP each week to kill a few, and have a BBQ
Yes slavery was bad - any more strawman arguments need to be dismissed?
If you believe that a company only cares about greed and maximizing profits then you have to take that line of thinking all the way. Businesses that want to maximize profits will seek to expand to new markets, attract top talent that adds more value and become more efficient. That drives salaries up - not down.
Are there exceptions? Sure - but on the whole, by itself, corporate greed is not a bad thing.
Liberals always rail against corporate greed - but greed is what will make us all better off.
This thread, like many discussions, is full of generalizations. Greed is just a word and we should talk about doings and not about words.
You are right, but not in every case. If a fast food chain does expand they don't need to attract many new talents (note: I didn't write "no talents"), they have to find enough low wage workers.
Because it is bad for both the people and the market. In a perfectly competitive market price gets near marginal cost. In a monopolistic market prices will raise far above this margin and the company will try to raise high barriers to enter the market.
Do you really think there should be no regulations at all? What about selling unhealthy food to maximize profits? And don't accuse me of endorsing over-regulation, I never said that
You are right, but not in every case. If a fast food chain does expand they don't need to attract many new talents (note: I didn't write "no talents"), they have to find enough low wage workers.
Because it is bad for both the people and the market. In a perfectly competitive market price gets near marginal cost. In a monopolistic market prices will raise far above this margin and the company will try to raise high barriers to enter the market.
Do you really think there should be no regulations at all? What about selling unhealthy food to maximize profits? And don't accuse me of endorsing over-regulation, I never said that
pocketfullofshells
Well-Known Member
no pure greed like to many american companies today, makes them better off, no one else. thats why economic inequality is so bad now, not that you care about that.
So let's see, investors get a return on their investment. Let's them invest further. Got a 401k ? That's you !
Employees have jobs. You work ? That's you !
Taxes paid local state federal. That helps you !
Economic inequality comes from workers devaluing themselves by flunkING out. The rest of the world have been bettering themselves. What ye sow also shall you reap.
Attracting more low wages workers still drives salaries up for those people. Someone who is unemployed has a salary of $0. If a fast food chain gets "greedy" and expands and creates a job paying minimum wage for that person everyone is better off are they not?
Agreed they will try - but without governmental help you can never really block all entry into the market place. A company that obtained a monopoly legally likely did so by being very efficient and effectively out-competing everyone else in the space. (or they invented something and competitors just have not caught up yet) At some point even if you obtained a monopoly you cannot maintain that efficiency if you have no competition - and short of governmental intervention there is no realistic way to keep all competitors out of the market.
Do you really think there should be no regulations at all? What about selling unhealthy food to maximize profits? And don't accuse me of endorsing over-regulation, I never said that
I am willing to accept we need some regulations, just not the draconian over-regulations that you surely embrace
. Kidding aside, I question what you mean by "selling unhealthy food"? Is that like selling a bag of candy, or what do you mean by that? My general thought is that government can (and should) set basic baselines on safety to protect the people of whatever country they manage. Outside of that, I think they have no business picking winners and losers and distorting market forces by protecting some markets via regulation. For example, I had a friend who manufactured ladders in Texas. Every year or so like clockwork OHSA would come in and fine him for the most absurd items - such as a railing on a ramp was 1/4 inch to low so he incurred all kinds of fines for nothing essentially.That is just one example of many of the stupid burdens government put on his business and it ultimately got to the point where he said forget it - and moved production to China. Stupid regulations and make work items for these regulators does cost people their jobs. It is not that we need no regulation - but we sure could stand to do away with a lot of stupid regulation.
Werbung:
No - I do not care about economic inequality. It is a meaningless arbitrary measure. Why are you worse off if a billionaire gets richer? If that same billionaire takes all his money and moves it overseas the measure of inequality would suddenly look a little more equitable - but has anything changed - is anyone any better off?
Let's take Exxon for example. That bastion of 'big greedy oil" that just expands on the backs of the poor people they exploit right? If only Exxon would do something to benefit the country and stop being so greedy just to make themselves "richer" right?
Let's slow down and examine reality. According to the American Petroleum Institute, private and public pension funds – managing assets on behalf of more than 60 million U.S. households in 145 million accounts – own nearly a third of all shares in U.S. oil and gas companies. Mutual funds and individual retirement plans account for nearly 40 percent more. So who benefits when Exxon succeeds? The odds are you do. You want to crusade for higher taxes and taking more from companies like Exxon - you need to be honest with yourself and recognize you are not crusading against billionaires - you are demanding what amounts to lower returns for over 145 million Americans via their retirement funds - all in the name of "fairness."
