[nradov]

That rather misses the point. The entire reason we have corporations is to abstract those issues away. For most routine business it's better to deal with a faceless corporation instead of trying to personalize everything. The corporation itself can be held accountable for contract compliance and in extreme cases you can get a court order to seize corporate assets; that's much easier than trying to seize and auction off the CEO's personal art collection or whatever.

[BLKNSLVR]

My understanding is that Board members are intended to be personally responsible for actions of the company.

Which is why homeless people and ne'er-do-wells get paid $10 to sign a piece of paper (which remains unread) but states this responsibility for shell companies X, Y, and Z.

Also, by design, shell companies don't tend to have assets worth seizing.

[nradov]

Your understanding is mostly wrong under US federal and state law. Generally Board members are not personally liable for corporate debts. It is only possible to pierce the corporate veil in unusual situations, like if they engaged in criminal activity or illegally tried to put corporate assets into their own names in an attempt to hide those from creditors or violate a court order.

[BLKNSLVR]

I'll take that under advisement.

I know I'm mixing up limited understandings of Australian and US legislation, and sprinkling on top of that my frustrations with those two fairly strict legislative countries allowing business to be conducted with organisations that have opaque, international ownership structures. It's a glaring hypocrisy (that I'm likely missing a fair bit of nuance due to only a surface understanding) given the ratcheting up of the surveillance state on individuals.

The whole area is something that I would like to gonzo-research as a retirement project.