[rhizome]

In just world this would result in a prison sentence, banishment from stock exchanges, and revocation of their corporate charter. The fact that there is no capital punishment for companies, especially public ones, provides a moral hazard.

[josho]

I agree. Our society tolerates white collar crime far more than we should.

We've got a good handle on things like punishing criminals that rob someone at gunpoint. However, we struggle with seeing the CEO making short term loan to his company as theft from investors (the short term loan hid the fact that the company wasn't meeting its presumably publicly announced growth targets).

The issue is that white collar crime needs to show criminal intent. But, in this case the CEO didn't have criminal intent to steal, rather his intent was simply to boost his business (with the consequence of misleading investors).

[rhizome]

I view white-collar crime as primarily an individual act. Corporate crime, such as we saw with HSBC, Dow Chemical, and even Mitchell Jessen, escapes significant punishment, only very rarely rising to criminal conduct. That the conduct is legal, or considered legal, is a policy and legislative outcome.

As for intent, the law has centuries of precedent to incorporate into criminal statutes that affect corporate activities. It's just that the standards are artificially high and don't take into account the diffuse nature of the enterprise. But we have several decades of even that which could be applied, but isn't.

[jacquesm]

> capital punishment for companies

That's the second time today I see this, is this some kind of meme?

[philovivero]

Yes, but it's been around for years.

If corporations are persons, and they can commit felonies, why not give them punishments that are analogous to what you'd give a person who committed a felony?

[dragonwriter]

> If corporations are persons, and they can commit felonies, why not give them punishments that are analogous to what you'd give a person who committed a felony?

Because corporate personhood is a legal fiction, and a corporate death penalty doesn't really hurt the people who a corporation stands in for very much, and hurts lots of other people a lot.

[rhizome]

a corporate death penalty doesn't really hurt the people who a corporation stands in for very much

I know, that's why I included prison.

[jessaustin]

Corporate death would just be another form of bankruptcy, which hurts shareholders and employees but wouldn't harm anyone else. Actually since this would be a rare form of bankruptcy with plenty of assets, it could be set up to pay restitution to various corporate victims as well.

[rhizome]

I wasn't aware of its prevalence, but hey. Great minds yadda yadda.

[jessedhillon]

Yes, punish the hundreds who simply do their job by forcing the company to go out of business, instead of trying to steer it towards a more productive future. We've gotta justify that pitchfork investment, don't we?

[hiou]

You punish the family when you send a parent to prison.

[jessaustin]

I'm sure I've seen "just doing my job" invoked in a pejorative sense, in close parallel to "just following orders"? When one's job is to harm society, society might step in, even if one "didn't know".

[jessedhillon]

Is your argument that P2P lending is analogous to the Holocaust?