[jobu]

They've also done two other great episodes on patents:

412 - http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2012/10/23/163480928/episode-...

551 - http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2014/07/09/329895088/episode-...

Side topic, but I really wish Planet Money would look into medical re-patenting. Growing up I needed albuterol inhalers occasionally and I remember them costing less than $10, but recently my kid needed one and it was $60 with copay (over $100 without insurance). That's when I found this article: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/13/us/the-soaring-cost-of-a-s...

TL;DR - Inhalers use CFC's (ozone hole making), but scientists and environmentalists recommended an exception for them when banning CFC's because the amounts were so tiny and the medical benefits so huge. The pharmaceutical industry decided to lobby against the exception so they could reformulate the inhaler and introduce a new patent - and make billions on a 30+ year old drug.

[click170]

Frankly this leaves me wondering why we leave medicine to private companies when we have agreed as a society that public health is the governments concern.

Its unreasonable to expect a publicly traded company to do anything other than chase profits the best way they can.

[alphapapa]

Obviously "we" have not agreed that that is the case.

> Its unreasonable to expect a publicly traded company to do anything other than chase profits the best way they can.

And that attitude is why we can't have nice things. That would be what's known as "enabling." How about, "It's unreasonable to expect a beer company to do anything other than sell as much alcohol as they can, however they can, to whomever they can." Or, "It's unreasonable to expect an oil company to do anything other than ship and sell as much oil as they can as cheaply as they can."

No. Companies, publicly traded or not, are not mindless automatons, inhumanly calculating the optimal methods to extract as much profit as possible, even though they do seem that way. Companies are comprised of people, people who are a part of the society in which their company does business. Therefore they have--should have--the responsibility to behave ethically to society, not merely their shareholders. And even besides that, shareholders' ultimate interests are not served if their companies behave in ways that are destructive to the societies in which they live.

I don't know where this idea that "companies are required or expected to make as much profit as legally possible" came from, but it's 1) untrue, and 2) morally and ethically wrong, regardless of #1. Please stop enabling this behavior by spreading this incorrect and just plain wrong idea.

[angersock]

And even besides that, shareholders' ultimate interests are not served if their companies behave in ways that are destructive to the societies in which they live.

Unless the destruction occurs outside of the realm (spatial or temporal) of the shareholders, in which case the destruction can rightfully be modeled as an externality and ignored.

I don't know where this idea that "companies are required or expected to make as much profit as legally possible" came from

Started with Dodge v. Ford Motor Co.:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Co.

This was somewhat superseded by Shlensky v. Wrigley:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shlensky_v._Wrigley

This in turn is arguably superseded by eBay v. Newmark:

http://www.litigationandtrial.com/2010/09/articles/series/sp...

Please stop enabling this behavior by spreading this incorrect and just plain wrong idea.

It's more dangerous to assume that corporations can be held to task than it is to assume that they are amoral profit-seeking entities. Only in the former case are you unpleasantly surprised if you're wrong.

[alphapapa]

> Unless the destruction occurs outside of the realm (spatial or temporal) of the shareholders, in which case the destruction can rightfully be modeled as an externality and ignored. ... It's more dangerous to assume that corporations can be held to task than it is to assume that they are amoral profit-seeking entities. Only in the former case are you unpleasantly surprised if you're wrong.

You are missing the point just as the gp did. I never said that corporations can be held to task for such things.

I'm talking about what they _should_ do, i.e. right vs. wrong, i.e. morality. And such hypothetical destruction cannot _rightfully_ be ignored, because to do so is _morally wrong._

_That_ is the point. By continuing to miss it you are further illustrating the problem. Please wake up.

[angersock]

What part of "morality doesn't apply to businesses" don't you understand? Do you blame a cat for catching a mouse? Do you blame a cruise missile for destroying a target? Do you blame a tornado for eviscerating a house? There are things to which the lens of morality offers very little.

What you want to claim is that corporations should view their actions morally, and what everyone is telling you is that no they shouldn't. You present (as a sibling comment) the notion that a company given a choice between the "wrong but profitable" and the "right but less profitable" should choose the "right" thing.

And we're telling you, we're all telling you, that you cannot evaluate a corporation through such a calculus!

Is the corporation going to Heaven or Hell because of how it's lived its "life"? No. Is the corporation going to have more friends because it's been "nice"? No. Is the corporation going to have better credit because, goshdarnit, it really tried to "help"? No. Are consumers going to change their buying habits because of what the company has done to its workers? Probably not--just look at Nike.

Look, I dig the whole rage against the machine thing you're going for--I've been there myself. "There's morality in the world, goddamnit, there's right and wrong! We can't let the corporations run amok and ruin our nation and communities! This is a democracy! This is America!" you cry.

There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only Facebook and Google and Apple and IBM, Haliburton, GE, Tata Group, Phillip Morris, Alibaba, Mitsubishi. Those are the nations of the world today--or at least as far back as Network!

Is it monstrous? Absolutely. Is it something we should find an alternative to? Certainly. But is it something to which it is useful to apply human morality to? No, and it never will be--you must engage the beast where it lives, on its terms.

[alphapapa]

> What part of "morality doesn't apply to businesses" don't you understand?

What part of "businesses are comprised of and run by human beings" don't you understand? What part of "businesses have legal, ethical, and moral responsibilities to government and society" don't you understand? These are not wishes, these are reality.

> Do you blame a cat for catching a mouse? Do you blame a cruise missile for destroying a target? Do you blame a tornado for eviscerating a house? There are things to which the lens of morality offers very little.

Cats are not human beings, they are animals. They cannot think, speak, or reason.

Cruise missles are not human beings, they are machines.

Tornadoes are hot human beings, they are weather phenomena.

What is wrong with you? Are you just trolling or do you really think like this?

> And we're telling you, we're all telling you, that you cannot evaluate a corporation through such a calculus!

Certainly I can. And I will. And this is nothing new. This is why there are laws regulating corporations in a million ways, from financial regulations to the EPA to the FCC. For example, if morality had no bearing on corporations' actions, there would be no laws against insider trading, or price/wage fixing, monopoly abuse, etc. (And you can cry "ethics, not morality!" all you want, but ethics are ultimately based on morals. The principle of right vs. wrong remains.)

Where do you come up with this idea that corporations can do whatever they want in a mindless pursuit of profit? This is not the case, it never has been, and it continues to become less the case as more and more laws and regulations are enacted.

> There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only Facebook and Google and Apple and IBM, Haliburton, GE, Tata Group, Phillip Morris, Alibaba, Mitsubishi. Those are the nations of the world today--or at least as far back as Network!

Oh please. There is some truth to that idea, but it is not done, as you seem to think.

> Is it monstrous? Absolutely. Is it something we should find an alternative to? Certainly. But is it something to which it is useful to apply human morality to? No, and it never will be--you must engage the beast where it lives, on its terms.

If everyone thought like this, the United States (and many other nations) wouldn't even exist. It's because of those who had the courage to stand up and fight for change that we are having this conversation today.

Your attitude is useless. It is part of the problem. We need principled leadership that stands up for what is right, regardless of the status quo (or the perceived one).

[spacemanmatt]

Thanks for the informed response. Someone has to. It's like no one understands fiduciary obligations.

[alphapapa]

No, it's like no one understands that there are things more important than money.

That is one of the chief problems with large corporations: the people making the decisions are so far removed--insulated--from the consequences that they feel no responsibility for the negative effects on other entities.

The numerous examples of corruption, evil, and greed in large corporations should come as no surprise--it's built-in to the system.

And when someone points it out, there's one after another of people like yourself who exhibit a deafening WHOOSH with yet another, "but, but, but...money!" The single-mindedness is astounding.

[cma]

>And even besides that, shareholders' ultimate interests are not served if their companies behave in ways that are destructive to the societies in which they live.

They can be. Say there are 1000 equal shareholders in a company, and they make up .01% of society. If they do $10,000,000 in damage to society they discount that by .01%, and just need to earn $1,000 as a company, one dollar each, in exchange in order for it to be "rational".

[lotsofmangos]

I find A&E makes a good example for this.

For A&E to work well needs A&E departments located within easy reach of an incident and to be staffed by people who are kept in practice and will operate immediately if required, instead of doing financial admin first.

Now this list of factors means you can always make money by shutting down A&E departments as they cannot do anything but operate at a loss.

However no matter how much money you make by doing so, you are increasing your own accidental mortality risk.

[chrisbennet]

What does "A&E" stand for? Edit: Found it - it is The UK equivalent of what Americans call a hospital Emergency Room or just "Emergency".

[stan_rogers]

Accident and emergency; it's the British English equivalent of the North American ER (emergency room).

[chrisbennet]

Edit 2: I typed too slow! Thanks though!

[TheSpiceIsLife]

Accident and emergency

[alphapapa]

That requires seeing everything as a matter of money. Not everything in life can be measured in dollars and cents.

We are all poorer--as a society--when some people profit at others' suffering.

You are demonstrating precisely the problem mentality that I am pointing out. Please wake up.

[AnthonyMouse]

> That requires seeing everything as a matter of money. Not everything in life can be measured in dollars and cents.

What do you propose to measure it in then? There are situations where you can save X number of lives by doing Y hours of labor, and there are cases where Y is so much larger than X that you have to say no, we aren't going to do that. How do you propose to make that kind of decision without using some comparable measure of value?

Nobody can claim that the current situation is optimal. It's kind of terrible. But it isn't because we measure things using money.

[alphapapa]

Your comparison is a bit apples-and-oranges. I'm talking about a situation in which a corporation can decide to either a) do something, make more profit, but harm other people in the process; or b) not do that something, make less profit, and leave others unharmed.

In such a situation, the choice should be made without metrics and comparisons--it's a matter of right vs. wrong. That is what is missing from the decision-making process: morality.

[cma]

It is a systemic problem with the incentives. If the CEO is moral enough to go against shareholder interest, he'll be replaced. If not, the board members will be replaced through vote and possibly sued for going counter to shareholder interests. If not, the shareholders will be replaced by shareholders a more ruthless out-competiting company.

Imploring everyone to just be more moral isn't going to fix the systemic problems.

[icebraining]

Isn't it interesting that despite the ban on CFCs, and the lack of an exception for medicine, being something imposed by the government, your response is to blame the companies?

Don't get me wrong, I completely agree their lobbying is against the general interest of society, but it was the government that was elected to protect the interests of the public, and failed.

[aylons]

The point is, both the urge and the power to lobby against the interest of the people come from the private and profitable nature of their interests.

It was not a punctual failing of the moralities of the companies, it is a consequence of a system that stimulates them to do it and given them the power to do it successfully.

[icebraining]

But what actually hurt the people wasn't the lobbying, it was the actual banning of the CFCs in medicinal applications, which wasn't made by company with private and profitable interests, but by the government!

[aylons]

What I believe you're missing is that the government is not an isolated entity in a vacuum. Its made of people and groups that make their case and express their interests.

In this case the interests of the private company prevailed. Notice that the proposal of not banning CFCs in medicinal applications was also a decision to be made by the government, but the pressure from the other side was simply not enough.