[mikeash]

I completely disagree. It's absolutely wrong for a business to lobby for their interests when it harms others. This is little different from dumping toxic waste into the local reservoir. That would be wrong even if it were legal.

Obviously, a lot of business don't really care about right and wrong, and so they'll still do it. But we can condemn it.

[jandrese]

Asking people to act against their own interests voluntarily never works in the long term. It is safer to assume that businesses will act in self serving ways. Where we currently fall down is with legislators completely failing their mission of protecting the public. Your congressmen shouldn't be representing corporate interests, in a capitalist society their interests will always be well represented. The congressmen should be protecting the people who don't have the money to represent their own interests. That's one of the most important jobs of government in a capitalist economy--to prevent the wealth from accumulating entirely at the top as will otherwise naturally happen. When government fails at its job you end up with times like the Guided Age, which can typically only be corrected with massive social upheaval or devastating war.

[doktrin]

> Asking people to act against their own interests voluntarily never works in the long term. It is safer to assume that businesses will act in self serving ways.

Then it's also safe to assume that legislators will act in self serving ways. Sure, they should represent your interests but let's not be naive.

IMO people should be held accountable for acting immorally, full stop. Just because it's particularly bad when public servants fail in their job doesn't let others off the hook.

[John23832]

I never said we can't condemn the behavior of businesses.

The prime objective for a business is to make money. All the ethics, right/wrongs, etc are things that we expect from the people who run those businesses. But the business is there to make money.

It is up to the people in charge of making choices for society to make the right choices. It's not the responsibility of the business. They have every right to lobby for anything they want.

[cheriot]

"The prime objective for a business is to make money."

A business is a way for people to organize and collaborate and it does not absolve those people of their moral and ethical obligations. Individuals are expected to prioritize family, community, country, religion, etc. We need to stop giving people a free pass just because they hide behind articles of incorporation.

[John23832]

What are you going to do, put a business in jail?

Hold the people who have made you promises and then failed to follow through responsible. Aka, your politicians. They are your backstop. What makes Goldman, GSK, Haliburton, or any of the other shady, scummy businesses out there responsible to you? They are responsible to the law on the books.

Our politicians are supposed to prevent business from screwing our society. Stop giving them an out. They failed, time and time again.

[mikeash]

I think it could work really well to put businesses "in jail." You can't physically put them in prison, but you can achieve the same ultimate effect by forcing them to cease operations for a period of time. If a crime would put a person in prison for five years, then maybe it should also force a business to cease operations for five years.

[John23832]

Well that may be a good possible solution, but currently we don't/can't do that.

[mikeash]

Didn't "what are you going to do" indicate a potential hypothetical?

[cheriot]

Everyone in a society has an obligation to that society. America seems to be forgetting this. A business doesn't change the obligations of the individuals so put the individuals in prison if needed. Did someone sign off on dumping toxic waste or robbing people's savings? Would have been illegal if a person did it without getting a paycheck? Why does a paycheck change anything? Let them answer for their actions.

Stop expecting politicians to be perfect.

[John23832]

> Everyone in a society has an obligation to that society.

You're right, every person does.

> A business doesn't change the obligations of the individuals so put the individuals in prison if needed. Did someone sign off on dumping toxic waste or robbing people's savings? Would have been illegal if a person did it without getting a paycheck? Why does a paycheck change anything? Let them answer for their actions.

What are you trying to say here? That we should hold people/businesses legally responsible? No one is arguing against that.

> Stop expecting politicians to be perfect.

I expect politicians to do their job.

[jungturk]

The charter granted to the business can contain clauses requiring the business to attend to more than just its own returns.

The state or the people grant that charter to the business, with the benefits its confers regarding liability and taxation, so we could decide to do so only if the business commits to the terms.

There's no inalienable right to incorporation in the US constitution - the corporation is a statutory fiction we've all agreed to use.

[John23832]

That charter turns a moral responsibility into a legal one. No one is arguing against holding businesses legally accountable.

[WillyOnWheels]

PG&E was convicted of a felony.

http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/01/26/pge-gets-maximum-sente...

They're not supposed to pass the fine to their customers in any way. I don't believe anything.

[gech]

Business lobbies to prevent enforcement... Also don't forget the revolving door, your dichotomy of politicians vs business is paper thin

[John23832]

The revolving door is a separate issue that I acknowledge is a problem.

[mikeash]

How can we condemn something that's "never wrong"?

They have no right to lobby for anything they want. They may have the legal right to do so, but it's still wrong in some cases.

[John23832]

You're conflating two different things.

If Company A wanted to lobby for the killing of all blue eyes babies, they could. They can make signs, start campaigns, attempt to get a meeting with a member of Congress.

All of that lobbying would be useless though because we all know that that idea is disgusting and wrong (hopefully we all know... with this current climate, nothing is certain).

The act of killing the babies is wrong, and we can pretty much all agree on that. But that company has every right to lobby for that position. No matter how crazy.

> They may have the legal right to do so, but it's still wrong in some cases.

You seem to agree here.

[mikeash]

I fully understand the distinction, and I think you're the one conflating two different things. How exactly am I supposed to interpret "wrong" in your original comment? Without context, that usually refers to morality, not legality. Furthermore, you used the word "wrong" a second time to describe elected officials going against the public interest, which is legally right. I see no way to read your original comment other than saying it is not morally wrong for businesses to lobby in this way.

But then afterwards you concentrate entirely on legality. If you just wanted to say that it's legal for businesses to lobby like this, I don't disagree, but I don't see how that position is described in the original comment, nor do I even understand the point of making that comment, since I think we all already know that it's legal.

If you did indeed mean to say that it's legally allowed but morally reprehensible, then we are indeed in agreement and I don't think there's much to say here.

[jakelazaroff]

> The act of killing the babies is wrong, and we can pretty much all agree on that. But that company has every right to lobby for that position. No matter how crazy.

No one is saying they don't have that legal right; they're saying that "legal" doesn't imply "ethical".

Consider Company A's lobbying efforts succeed and people start killing blue-eyed babies. Even if Company A never kills a baby, they still did something unethical, since there's a causal relationship between their lobbying efforts and a thing we just agreed was wrong.

[M_Grey]

Why is it incumbent on politicians to be moral, "do the right things", but not businesses?

That's a laughably arbitrary choice you're making.

[John23832]

Because "morality" is a uniquely human trait, and we elect politicians to enact laws (which are group morality, codified).

We pay businesses for goods and services.

[chillacy]

Aren't businesses run by humans? The government is run by people too, are they incapable of morality as well?

[M_Grey]

So you're just going to pick and choose as it suits you, and then act baffled when people point out the hypocrisy in that course?

Oh.

[John23832]

You asked my logic, I gave it to you, you respond and say that I "pick and choose", with sarcasm.

Please stop being a childish.

[nunyabuizness]

What's laughable? You can choose which businesses you want to interact with anytime you want, and if you don't like their policies, choose someone else.

While you can "choose" a politician, you get whoever the group chose for 2-6 years. Don't like your president or their morals? Deal with it until the next round of choice.

I think that imbalance in individual authority and power gives everyone the right to hold public and private individuals to different standards.

[jpetso]

With all due respect, "the group" decides what I can buy just as much as they decide who represents me.

Remember the time when there was a single phone out that combined flagship performance with a size that fits comfortably in one hand? Or the time when laptop manufacturers included PgUp/PgDown/Home/End keys instead of hiding all of those behind a Fn key? Or the time when I could use the internet without being tracked by every single competitor? Good luck avoiding Facebook or Google Docs when your charity has bought into those for communication?

The businesses everyone's fawning about are also the businesses who have best figured out protection from customer choice by employing lock-in and network effects. That's not choice, that's rule by moat.

Customer choice is for suckers. When a flood of ads and convenience can lure the masses, who would even pay attention to the few idiots who vote with their wallets or think of long-term market implications?

My wallet has no more effect on product availability than my vote has on the politician who represents me and what policies they support.

[M_Grey]

>What's laughable? You can choose which businesses you want to interact with anytime you want, and if you don't like their policies, choose someone else.

You try to exercise your consumer rights next time you're in a hospital, or something unforeseen occurs, or you're subject to a telecom monopoly, etc... etc...

Your way of thinking only works in a perfect fiction that has never and will never exist, except as a sop to some egos.

[pessimizer]

Business aren't actually people, they are fictions. Your judgement doesn't appeal to their consciences or affect their senses of self-worth. They don't have hearts. Strategies appealing to their better natures are doomed to fail.