At the heart of progressive thought is concern over the twin evils of oppression and exploitation. O'Reilly’s piece focuses on the latter but relies on the assu

At the heart of progressive thought is concern over the twin evils of oppression and exploitation. O'Reilly’s piece focuses on the latter but relies on the assumption that profit==exploitation. I’m not convinced it is that simple. I wish I could have had a chat with Milton about the Friedman doctrine [1]. I want to give him the benefit of the doubt. From my perspective, shareholder value is a relatively easy measure that acts as a proxy for the true goal of a corporation: creating sustainable customer value. Within the context of his original article, Friedman was arguing that customers, employees, and shareholders could choose to give to charity, for instance, but it is wrong for a corporation to do it on their behalf. The concept is not intuitive but it is far from promoting selfishness. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedman_doctrine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedman_doctrine