dinner in London, a chief executive promised that his airline would soon offer electric flights. A credit provider enthused about increasing financial inclusion in the developing world; a luxury-car executive promised to replace the leather in her vehicles’ opulent interiors with pineapple matting and mushroom-basedleather. They seemed to think such things made the companies they run sound more attractive. They probably felt that they were doing good.
In the face of this rising tide, the Business Roundtable has either seen the light or caved in, depending on whom you ask. On August 19th the great and good of-land announced a change of heart about what public companies are for. They now believe that firms should indeed serve stakeholders as well as shareholders.
Such heretics can now hold their heads up again. This is not simply because of the political climate or the public mood. Some economists argue that Friedman’s position belongs to a simpler time. Oliver Hart of Harvard University and Luigi Zingales of the University of Chicago see his argument as principally motivated by a form of the agency problem; he didn’t like managers being charitable with shareholders’ money, even if it was ostensibly in the firm’s interests.
Firms in other industries are having similar thoughts. In each business, says Mr Haythornthwaite of MasterCard, a wave of digitisation is likely to lead to one company pulling ahead. Because of that concentration of power, he says, the winning platform will need to forge a close link with society to maintain trust.
Companies are also backing liberal social causes. In 2015 Marc Benioff of Salesforce, a software firm, led other bosses, including Apple’s Tim Cook, into opposing a bill in Indiana that would have allowed discrimination against gay people. After President Donald Trump’s election in November 2016, bosses mounted the barricades over his ban on travel to America from Muslim-majority countries.
The politics of the consumer are not the only ones that firms need to consider; in tech, particularly, the politics of the workforce matter. It was the company’s employees who complained about Salesforce’s links to immigration control. Last year, employees at Google forced the firm to stop providing the Pentagon with, a cloud-computing facility for the armed forces.
alllibertynews That is BS. No they are not woke, they understand that they can profit by passing the costs on to the customer with interest.
No comment
It’s a PR scam.
But the world watches the amazon burn and do nothing
Pursuing share holder value has helped destroy communities and spread inequality - it was a false doctrine which is ending up with capitalism undermining itself. It has to go.
Idiotic. Companies can say ANYTHING, it's what they DO that matters. Look at how damaging and price gouging pharma has been with their so called non profit drug foundations. It's criminal.
Alleluja... 😕
The responsibility that matters when it comes to nature is polluting & destroying flora and fauna in the first place. When they show up, contrite, & do everything in their power to aright their wrongs, I'll consider it a debt to our world repaid. Meantime color me very skeptical.
You have an extra 'to' in there. Maybe they are doing more than they have in the past, but 'more than they have to'? Are you arbitrating what they have to do?
I'll believe it when I see it. AFAIK, corporations aren't doing anything meaningful, just PR stunts.
🤔people should wear the leafs to help others rather than clothes if they really want to reduce the speed of climate Change, as they usually buy clothes from shops. Others would drive the trucks which produce greenhouse gases to transfer these clothes from a city to another city.
“More than they have to”? Seriously?
Climate change isn’t real the weather changes all the time
'Thanks for the ham & cheese hero, kind sir, but does it have Colman's Mustard on it?'
I’ll be selling the stock of any company that doesn’t prioritize my interests.
How magnanimous of them. I have no problem with making $ (business person here) but the current corporate model is unsustainable. Will they take a pay cut to correct the overly top heavy distribution of benefits?
Just words.
It’s about fucking time! All these tax cuts cities/states provide corporations is sickening. PAY YOUR SHARE!
When I invest my retirement money in a business, I don’t want them to act like a charity.
...myself to everything you own.
The government took away charity from the Churches by saying the gov knew more on how to help. Now we are seeing how even companies are realizing that when they walk out the door, they can see how little the government works for poor, well it all comes down to poor spending.
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
No thanks. Corporatism is the new socialism. Just get rid of their corruption within government and elections. Allow truly free markets and we won't need their 'benevolence'. In fact, they won't be able to compete with true entrepreneurs.
You’ll do what we say-
We'll have FreeAid soon
I still don't think this is the case
When you have the strength and manpower to do so, by all means.
Hay que tener en cuenta a la sociedad y a Todos los stakeholders
Must help kashmiries rather than business man,bcz human rights is violating in kashmir
Science fiction