I watched "60 Minutes" tonight, 2 March 2003, and there was a segment on Saddam Hussein and his assets. He apparently has corporations scattered all over. Corporations act as a shield to his identity. Top people in the investigative fields are unable to determine where his assets are.

Putting various topics together: our country's rampant ethics problems involving corporations, undue political influence via corporations, Saddam Husein, the elitism thread, well, it seems to me corporations at a legal entity have problems which lead me to believe corporations are not in this country's best interest. I have not suddenly "seen the light" of Ralph Nader's philosophy. My concern is not that capitalism is bad and corporations just care about profits or people. It is much more in the area of accountability. People should be accountable. People should be treated the same. Corporations are a means to avoid both of these.

The potential for people such as Saddam or Bin Laden who have economic clout and are ruthless in their use of it is possible because of corporations. Going after these people is good but is there not a fundamental problem in our legal structure that makes such people have the opportunity?

There are many degrees of unethical or bad motivations which are not as extreme as Bin Laden or Saddam Hussein. What degree of this "legal" behavior will citizens tolerate? Are we overlooking an obvious diseased system in our wish to blame all these ills caused by a few bad people instead of going after the root of the problem?

This is not a well though out idea. There are no links. There is mostly intuition. My intuition tells me corporations are anti-liberty, anti-freedom, and will continue to be so unless using corporations for elitism is ended.

Do any of you share my uneasiness? Are we putting blinders on in regards to our corporation problems?

I am a Naderite, because I believe people are much more capable of being banal or evil when they are part of a group action. This is why I think Nader's emphasis on the whistle-blower is so important. Corporations try to shroud themselves in secrecy as much as possible. We need greater corporate transparency in accounting. (Using the same income statement for taxes and reporting income would be a good thing to do there) We also need to protect and help whistle blowers as much as possible.

Corporations are a necessary and vital part of our economy. Simply knowing that all individual employees are potential whistle blowers (no matter what the status of confidentiality agreements) when unethical (pipe dream ) or illegal (quite doable) activities are committed. I mean individuals can be held criminally accountable for participating in these acts later, why don't we find ways of making sure that whistle blowers are better protected and better appreciated in our society?

First of all, corporations are creations of the state, really, they are a state-created entity, and as such, they are neither interchangeable with nor necessary to free market capitalism. Adam Smith, in his The Wealth of Nations, was clear on his dislike of corporations. He mentioned them 12 times, never with praise. Typical of his opinions about corporations:



Through the first half of the nineteenth century, corporate charters were seen as created by the state legislature to serve a public good, and could be revoked by the state at will. Corporations were public entities, and did not share the constitutional property rights of individuals.

After the Civil War, corporations began to really assert their power. President Rutherford B. Hayes said regarding his own "election,"



This was the time of the robber barons, we all know them - Morgan, Rockefeller, Carnegie, Vanderbilt, etc. These powerful men leapt into the political disarray after the war and started gaining control of state legislatures, where the rights of the citizens and the states to revoke and oversee corporate activity started to be ripped away. This culminated in the 1886 SCOTUS case, Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad, wherein it was deigned that a corporation is a natural person under the constitution. Corporations therefore come under the protections of the Bill of Rights, just like individuals.

In being guaranteed the same right to free speech as individuals, corporations claimed they had the same right as any individual to influence the government in their own interests. So the voice of the individual is pitted against the huge financial resources of the corporation, making mockery of the constitutional intent that all citizens have an equal voice in the political debates of the country.

Needless to say, it's been downhill since then. Corporations have gained more and more sovereignty, eventually losing almost all ties to nationality - usually as a means to avoid taxation.

So do I have a problem with corporations? Hell yes I do! The thing is, they have been so effective at tying the idea of capitalism to corporatism, that even people who run small businesses, the true lifeblood of Smith's ideal free market system, are often duped into the fiction big business and small businesses are fighting the same battle, on the same side.

Sorry for the rant...

So is the problem with technology? How do hold a big international conclomerate locally accountable. It seems the charter idea is sound as long as the business operations are narrowly regional in scope. But modern technology has made them into world wide entities. They've become a man made environment. How do you get outside the box enough to bring them to heel? Hell they own governments. They're almost like oxygen in many cases. Think of telephones and electricity.

Maybe we'll have to rethink technology and bring it back into human scale.

Corporations are no different than Greenpeace, the NRA, or the AFL-CIO, they are entities, made up of INDIVIDUALS, who have a right to attempt to influence government. Corporations allow for the use of economies of scale, bringing prices down for the consumer, admittedly often at a high cost to the individual business owner. Corporations have created more good than all private cgharities that have ever existed. There is a problem that producer groups have a greater interest, and more resources, to further their interests than consumer groups. The sugar tariff is of little interest to consumers who may have their yearly expenses raised a couple bucks by it; it is of great interest to national sugar producers. Actually international corporations reduce the likelihood of excessive tariffs. The solution to too much corporate influence of government is the usual solution to almost all ills: LESS GOVERNMENT.

Yes, corporations are made up of individuals. I would like to see corporations treated like proprietorships. Each year, the profits are appropriated to those individuals who are then treated like all other individuals in the country. It does not seem to be a good thing to allow individuals to take on other names and then be treated under their own set of rules exclusive to a select few.

Groups of people sharing in ownership of a business is not a bad thing. Large businesses can and do contribute to our society. This does not justify having their own set of rules separate from other Americans.

Treating all people the same should lead to less government.

I do think we should limit all groups from donating to political candidates and their respective parties whether they are corporations, Greenpeace, NRA, or the AFL-CIO. Individuals of those groups can donate but not the groups themselves.

10's of millions of Americans own stocks, 10's of millions more are employed by corporations. Hardly a select few.

Not everyone owns stock. Why should those who do be treated differently than those who do not? Perhaps it is not a select few but a select many. It is still elitism.

Not all corporations are in place to hide the identity and assets of the stockholders but some are. That some stockholders are not benefiting from the corporation laws does not make it OK for some stockholders to benefit.

A lot of people die and never receive Social Security. A lot of people never receive welfare. Darn welfare elitists, why should they receive benefits other Americans cannot enjoy?

I can not see the parallel between Social Security and corporations. I do not see anyone using Social Security to hide their identity nor hide assets from taxation or lawsuits.

Well, the upper class or the rich seem to have more rights then the middle or dare i say the lower class, so yes i would think that the companies that hire people would hold great power over the people like the history of ford motors.

This is a bit misleading. In 1995, 41% of all American households owned some stocks, but most don't own very much. The richest 10% owned 88% of all stocks and mutual funds in that year. I am sorry not to have more current figures, but I know that the trend is still in this direction.

Gray Seal,

I saw the same 60 Minutes report and just shrugged. Of course the system is being used against the system, and nobody *in power* wants to change it.

Saddam has billions of bucks socked away in bank accounts hidden through various legal maneuvers. What, this is a new thing? I think not. It is actually a little humorous if you take a long-distance look at it. What a smartass!

Should corporations be changed? Eliminated? Replaced? I think better regulated, but I actually like corporations. I've worked for a lot of them, good and bad. Corporations can get things done on a grand scale--better than a bunch of small businesses trying to do something big together. What you gain in corporations is the ability to focus human brain and brawn power on a single purpose. Within the corporation, you have many fifedoms that need to be harnessed and directed like a team of horses.

I've always felt proud of my work within a well-run corporate structure. A poorly run structure is just a pain in the butt to work within.

So, the corporation is here to stay. It needs to be regulated from outside itself through government and/or auditing corps. This balance has recently been upset through fraud, self-serving dorks, and dare I say, a misguided embracing of pseudo-philosophy like that found in Ayn Rand fiction.

Back to Saddam and his billions: I imagine his fake corporations can be seized under existing law. He has funded Palestinian terrorists, and so he can be taken down.

Ticks you off though to hear about his bajillions of oil bucks, doesn't it?

When I question Corporations as legal entities it is not on the aspects of a business with many employees being a bad thing. All of the good points you have listed are indeed good points. Large businesses can accomplish tasks smaller business could not. When you mention "better regulated" you are touching on the theme I was bringing up with this topic. Better regulated for coercion and monopolys is a start. I also believe some legal definitions of corporations need to be changed in regards to tax law, for a start. The laws which lead to the wealthy being treated differently is the broad category of legal change which is needed.

Gray Seal,

Man, I wish I had the answers. You and I agree upon the questions. Hopefully, some smart folks are paying attention--could you be one of them?

Knowing the real question leads to the answer.

I think maybe Yoda said that

I just wanted to give you guys a link to a very interesting article which addresses some very concrete steps toward a more participatory economy, specifically ways to deal with the excess power and diminishing liability of huge corporations. Discussion of some of the points in the article would be quite appropriate for this thread:

Korten article

I have read the Korten article. Though full of nonsense sentence construction I did glean these points from it: getting corporations out of politics, restoring the integrity of national economic borders, and eliminating corporate welfare. They do not directly approach the question of how to define corporations. I do think political contributions should come from individuals and not businesses. I could not see an argument for why businesses should not operate internationally. Corporate welfare, pork barrel spending, and all such expenditure should not be a function of the government but that is another discussion and not part of the legal definition of corporations.

Korten also put forth corporations should not be treated as a person. I would agree with that concept. Corporations are an extension of an individual or a collection of individuals. Law should pertain to the corporation only as it would to those individuals. There should not be any special laws for the corporation but be applied to the individuals owning the business. This is the area which appeals to business owners as liability law protects a business owner's personal assets once the business is incorporated. A better solution to the liability law would be to end the use of the courts to assign blame to others and put the responsibility of judgement on the individual instead of pointing fingers at others. By creating the corporate loop-hole, we have created inequity in the legal system.

The fact is corporations profit society. The gains, to society, from corporate activity far exceed the losses. I agree with eliminating corporate welfare, as I do all other transfer payment programs. Corporations owe no one a living wage. Their only obligations are to their shareholders. Participatory economics is just another name for a highly socialistic society.

Once again, corporations are made up of individuals. Individuals as a unit, or as a group, have the right to express their views and engage in political campaigning.

Fascinating discussion.

Highlights from the Korten article:





Quarkhead writes:

It is mind boggling to believe that no one has successfully challenged this for over a hundred years. Quarkhead – are you familiar with any past or recent attempts to overturn this ruling?

hugo writes:

Private and political organizations do not represent individuals because they are oligarchies. By claiming the rights of the individual, an organization is asserting that it represents individuals. It does not. The amount of influence one has in an organization depends upon the amount of control/money one has; the person that controls over 50% of the organization has the opportunity to further his/her own interests, and as this is under the guise of representing the organization, it assumes a "democratic" role when it is in fact oligarchic.

Organizations are not composed of individuals. “Individuals” in our country have freedom of speech. An individual with 50% ownership of an organization can partake in significantly more “freedom of speech” than an individual who owns 1%. And equal rights, and equal opportunity, and protection…

If a corporation was run democratically - if every individual were given equal access to influence, then the group consensus may represent the individuals involved, but this is another matter.

Assuming the status of the individual is a distortion of The Bill of Rights.

Gray Seal writes:

I agree.

jjirout

Please show your evidence that most corporations are oligarchies, nothing could be further from the truth. Most corporations are involved in highly competitive markets. The fact is Ross Perot has more assets than I do, he can spend more money publicizing his views. His speech and my speech are equally "free". The only way me and millions of others can impress our views on others is to be a member of an organization, be it a corporation or a PAC. This is how the little man makes his voice heard, by being part of a group, with common goals, be it the NRA, Greenpeace or IBM.

I do not see a claim that "most corporations are oligarchies". Since you have brought up the point, what is your proof they are not? Why is the degree important to the discussion?




If this is the only way, why do you post on AmericasDebate? Which organizations have you personally joined which totally represent your views and have these organizations been successful?

I do think it proper for people to form groups to express common views. I do not think we need to limit this. I do think we need to limit them from monetary influence.

We should encourage free speech but discourage undue influence.

Let me change that to the "best" way. . the fact is corporations have a duty to their shareholders to maximize shareholder value, that includes rent-seeking activity. The best way to eliminate individuals or corporations exploiting the government, at the expense of other corporations or individuals, is to reduce the size of government.