[jnordwick]

Companies are just a realization that absent some outside force, multiple people will band together to work and sell the fruits of their labor.

Get rid of all laws and you will see companies naturally form except they would be held together by a myriad of individuals agreements.

Stopping companies or getting rid of them world requires stipping people from making agreements between themselves and be against human nature.

[mrob]

The crucial difference between companies, as the term is commonly used, and groups of private individuals, is limited liability. Companies are able to take risks that individuals would not because the individuals that make up the company are not held personally responsible for the potential consequences. Similar to granting people monopolies over culture and ideas with copyright and patents, this is a special privilege we give on the assumption that it will benefit society in the long run. If this assumption turns out to be false then the sensible thing to do is revoke that privilege, or replace it with a better one. Limited liability doesn't happen without state intervention.

[jnordwick]

That's a very good point, but I think in the absence of a legal entity of a corporation or similar, you would see contracts written (with suppliers for example) to limit liability anyways. Contracts between people would become vastly more complex, but still often provide the same benefit.

Because corporations are ultimately people, any restraints on them are essentially restraints on people. There is a very fine and difficult to draw line between a person talking about this awesome idea he has and a CEO talking about this awesome product he has, but the law does try to draw that line and I think is often fairly good at it.

[Slansitartop]

What are you talking about? No one's advocating abolishing corporations as a concept.