Shareholder versus Stakeholder Capitalism

[Doug28450]

Originally Posted by RedLS1GTO

Read? Yes... sometimes.

Do simple math? Not a chance.

Think and analyze critically? Never.

[Stangkiller]

Originally Posted by repo

The responsibility ends when they pay corporate taxes. How the Gov't spends and or disburses those dollars is up to them.

While that's true..perhaps the business would be more interested in helping the community if the government wasn't promising it all to the community already.

Take away publicly paid for housing and food stamps. I would almost guarantee you'd see corporate sponsored half way homes & soup kitchens. But the government "handles" it already. So just wince pay your 40% taxes and move on.

[nhlgopens]

[BuckyThreadkiller]

Originally Posted by repo

The responsibility ends when they pay corporate taxes. How the Gov't spends and or disburses those dollars is up to them.

But... but... but...

[repo]

Originally Posted by BuckyThreadkiller

But... but... but...

<Dems on> we want more, more more.....<Dems off>

[BuckyThreadkiller]

Let's look at it from the other end -

If you are an employee do you owe your corporation anything more than your 8-5?

Should employees have a moral responsibility to support the corporations charitable efforts even if they are at cross purposes with their own?

Should employees use only the corporation's products and never any of the competitors - ie should a GM employee ever own a Ford truck?

Should employees and managers have the obligation to perform corporately-guided volunteer activities on their own time?

Because if the "company" is going to be "responsible" to the public good, then the company's employees are the ones who'll be doing the work. That big faceless company isn't doing the work for the good of the social requirements of the community, the peple who work there will be the ones doing the heavy lifting. The company will just get the credit.

[Joecooool]

Once Romney gets the nomination, Obama has a billion dollars in his war chest to talk about how shitbags like Romney destroy corporations and their employees lives for the sole profit of wealthy investors.

Obama is going to win in a landslide.




The Romney campaign's "Bain problem," which is also now the Republican party's problem, doesn't look like it's going away anytime soon. Sure, Republicans are figuring out that this is not a winning issue for them. Thus they've circled their wagons around Romney, and even tried to get Newt to turn it down a couple of notches. Even the funder who gave Newt the money to green-light "When Mitt Romney Came To Down" is having second thoughts.

But never mind all that. The story has now gotten big enough to draw Sarah Palin out of an extended break from her bus tour, to advise Romney to open up the books on his tenure at Bain.


Republican star and Fox News political analyst Sarah Palin said criticism of Mitt Romney's record at Bain Capital by some Republican rivals is fair game and that voters should get "proof" of the 100,000 jobs Mr. Romney said he helped create while he headed the private equity firm.

In an interview with Fox host Sean Hannity Wednesday, Ms. Palin was asked about Texas Gov. Rick Perry's comments that Mr. Romney had practiced "vulture capitalism" rather than venture capitalism at Bain. Fox and The Wall Street Journal are owned by News Corp.

"I don't agree with attacks on free-market capitalism at all but I don't believe this is really what is at the heart of Gov. Perry's criticism of Romney and his time at Bain," the former Alaska governor replied. "This isn't about a politician making huge profits in the private sector. I think what Gov. Perry is getting at is that Gov. Romney has claimed to have created 100,000 jobs at Bain and you know, now people are wanting to know is there proof of that claim."

In a similar vein, Palin called on Romney to (finally) release his tax returns.


Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin suggested Wednesday that Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney should release his tax returns, as well as records from his time at Bain Capital.

"What I heard was a little bit what's going on today is some inoculation of the candidate himself, the frontrunner, and what it is that he's going to face when he comes up against Barack Obama. Nobody should be surprised that things about Bain Capital, and maybe tax returns not being released yet, and maybe some records not being as transparently provided to the public as voters deserve to see right now, don't be surprised that's all coming out today," she told Sean Hannity Wednesday on Fox News. "Let's get it out there, let's hear the defense of the candidates who are being charged with some of this. It's kind of like some come-to-Jesus moments for these candidates, and that's good, that's healthy."

The problem is, "free enterprise" is not on trial, and Bain isn't so much the representative of capitalism as the Frankenstein monster of capitalism stitched together and brought to life by conservative policy.

As a former manager at Bain made plain in an LA Time interview, job creation was never the mission at Bain Capital. So, there's very little evidence to support Romney's claim of creating 100,000 jobs at Bain. Bain won't release its overall record of jobs lost or created. Probably because it wasn't anybody's job to create jobs at Bain. Ask them about how much they returned to investors they can probably do that. Creating wealth was the job at Bain, not creating jobs. And we've already had a decade of the Bush tax cuts benefiting the wealthy, the rich getting richer, and zero job growth to teach us that creating wealth doesn't necessarily lead to job creation.

Warren Buffet, in a Time Magazine interview, made clear another reason why Romney couldn't follow Palin's advice if he wanted to.


When I ask whether Mitt Romney is a job creator or destroyer, Buffett says that while businesses shouldn't keep people they don't need, "I don't like what private-equity firms do in terms of taking out every dime they can and leveraging [companies] up so that they really aren't equipped, in some cases, for the future."

Even without a release from Bain, we what we know about one of Bain's acquisitions — in which Romney was a very hands-on manager — is exactly what Buffet described.


But an examination of the Dade deal, which Mr. Romney approved and presided over, shows the unintended human costs and messy financial consequences behind the brand of capitalism that he practiced for 15 years.

At Bain Capital’s direction, Dade quadrupled the money it owed creditors and vendors. It took steps that propelled the business toward bankruptcy. And in waves of layoffs, it cut loose 1,700 workers in the United States, including Brian and Christine Shoemaker, who lost their jobs at a plant in Westwood, Mass. Staggered, Mr. Shoemaker wondered, “How can the bean counters just come in here and say, Hey, it’s over?”

Why release records on jobs created or destroyed and risk confirming stories like the one above?

That brings me to why Romney can't exactly follow Palin's advice on taxes. Certainly not now, anyway, with a majority of Americans citing economic inequality as a source of conflict, Newt shining a spotlight on Mitt's vulture capitalism, and voters in the 99% steering clear of him.

If he releases his tax returns Romney runs the risk, in the current climate, of revealing just how rich he is. For the record, according to Wealth-X, he's one of the 10 richest people to run for president in the last 20 years. His net worth of $250 million makes him the third richest person to seek the oval office, after Ross Perot (#1) and Steve Forbes (#2).

Romney's wealth makes him one of the 3,140 wealthiest people in the country — that's the richest 0.001 percent of Americans. So, he's not just the candidate of the 1 percent, but the candidate of the 0.001 percent.

Releasing his tax returns would just confirm to many American voters that Romney got rich by practicing the very brand of vulture capitalism Buffet criticized, which is exactly what Newt accused him of.

Unfortunately for Romney, I think all of this is already but confirmed for a good many Americans.

Palin Advises Romney On Bain | OurFuture.org

[DAB]

as i noted in a thread in PRC, the GOP leader has 12 delegates - of 1190+ needed to be nominated. the game has just begun, i haven't had a chance to vote yet, nor have people in 48 states.

what say we let the process play out and see what happens?

funny, politicians are all for due process....until it comes to them being elected or nominated, then they just want to claim victory and go home.

[Cybercowboy]

Originally Posted by Joecooool

Obama is going to win in a landslide.

Wanna bet?

[Cybercowboy]

Originally Posted by Joecooool

Once Romney gets the nomination, Obama has a billion dollars in his war chest to talk about how shitbags like Romney destroy corporations and their employees lives for the sole profit of wealthy investors.

blah blah blah

<snip a bunch of crap>

Unfortunately for Romney, I think all of this is already but confirmed for a good many Americans.

Palin Advises Romney On Bain | OurFuture.org

This is from the wonderfully unbiased website OurFurture.org. Gaze into the wording of their about page, prepare to be amazified!

ABOUT US
WELCOME TO THE CAMPAIGN
FOR AMERICA'S FUTURE

We live in a remarkable political moment: precarious, yet potentially transforming. At the Campaign for America’s Future, our daily work is to bring about the progressive transformation.

After three decades of conservative dominance in American politics (orealy?), we Americans are threatened with economic disintegration, environmental devastation and international
isolation.

The list of failure is simply exhausting: a disastrous Iraq occupation, a destabilized Middle East and Asia, the persistent threat of terrorism, a menacing climate crisis, an insecure and dwindling energy supply, unprecedented trade deficits, unchecked global corporate power, our broken health care system, a weakened pension system and an increasingly inaccessible higher education system.

But out of the ashes of this era of conservative failure comes an historic opportunity for progressives to salvage the American Ideal and shape this young century.

That’s where we come in.

And this is where joecooool comes in too! Well, it's where he comes from anyway. Yay! He's progressive! Too bad Obama isn't progressive enough. If only we elected a real progressive someday, someone who would put that bad old capitalism in its place! Like maybe Lenin or somebody super cool like that!

[Chris Fowler]

Originally Posted by Joecooool

Once Romney gets the nomination, Obama has a billion dollars in his war chest to talk about how shitbags like Romney destroy corporations and their employees lives for the sole profit of wealthy investors.

And Romney can point to the last 3-4 years and show that Obama destroyed far more jobs and lives.

[repo]

All Obama's "hope and change" voters have grown up and realized it was a bunch of crap. They can't change their votes fast enough.

Remind me again what he and his administration have done so far?

[Joecooool]

Originally Posted by Cybercowboy

Wanna bet?

OK.

The bet is Obama gets re-elected.

$100?

[DAB]

Originally Posted by Joecooool

Obama is going to win in a landslide.

i'm not betting, but it would seem to me that a 'landslide' would equal or improve on the last election results, not popular votes, but electoral votes.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_...election,_2008

Obama received 365 electoral votes, and McCain 173. The popular vote was 69,456,897 to 59,934,814, respectively.

[vetteman9368]

Originally Posted by Joecooool

OK.

The bet is Obama gets re-elected.

$100?

How about if he does, I'll quit posting in any political thread. And if he loses you never post your leftist crap on here again?

[RedLS1GTO]

Originally Posted by Joecooool

Unfortunately for Romney, I think that many Americans are idiot liberals who don't have a f**king clue.

Fixed it for ya.

[Blademaker]

Originally Posted by vetteman9368

How about if he does, I'll quit posting in any political thread. And if he loses you never post your leftist crap on here again?

[GS Ragtop]

Businesses should not be confused with philanthropic organizations. There's plenty of both - they each have their role.

IMO, a business exists solely to generate return on capital by effectively satisfying its customer's needs.

If a privately-held company wants to blur the lines and have a parallel mission of community service, I applaud the owners. Not so with publicly-held companies, though. They have a responsibility to return the maximum profit to shareholders. There's very little room or patience for parallel missions.

Pretty simple concepts. I never understand why big corporations are made out to be villains in the US -- we should all cheer when they win, not knock them for being successful...

[Giraffe (He/Him)]

Not so with publicly-held companies

Why do you think so many of them do community service?

[RedLS1GTO]

Originally Posted by Thomas

Why do you think so many of them do community service?

To portray themselves in a positive light and in turn increase profits.