Flame — HabitableZone

Flame » in reply to re: Maybe I should explain...

re: Maybe I should explain...
ER — (archived)

That's all a working man wants, a fair day's pay for a fair day's work.

When a man owns his own business, he decides what he wants in terms of his own profitability, and he decides what he's willing to pay for it in terms of his own ethics and self-respect; for success, security, and growth. Eventually, if he's good and if he's lucky, he will have built a machine that makes money but that also serves his community and which he will be proud to pass on to his children. His reputation is tied up in that business. I have a great deal of respect for that.

The large corporation, beholden only to its stockholders and run by hired professionals with no personal stake in it (and golden parachutes for bailing out with), is never successful or profitable enough. No matter how well it's doing, there is always the pressure to grow more, and be even more profitable. There is pressure to cut corners, cut quality, do whatever it takes, and no matter how well you do, next year you'll have to do better. Even profitable businesses are being liquidated today so the capital can be diverted to what are considered even more profitable ventures. The people who own are not the same ones who run the business, their reputations and their honor are not at stake. I have nothing but contempt for that.

Of course, large publicly-owned corporations can be honorable enterprises, just as mom-and-pop shops can be crooked and corrupt,
but I think you see what I'm getting at. And what I fear is that the true genius of capitalism, that personal entrepreneurial spirit, is losing ground and being replaced by the other. And it has to compete with it in the market place, too.

Log in or register to post.

The whole thread (49 posts)