> and tried to make seem as if profit is the be-end-all That statement was paired with a teleological statement about the purpose of a company. When paired wit

> and tried to make seem as if profit is the be-end-all That statement was paired with a teleological statement about the purpose of a company. When paired with the common usage of the word "company", the statement becomes tautological. Admittedly, this isn't the most insightful realization ever, but the point from the comment was that people forget that a profit needs to be extracted. > My overall point is still consistent with Drucker's "the purpose of a company is to create customers". And, pray-tell, why do you think companies want customers, if not for eventual profit? > Amazon ran without profit for 10 years. Did we magically call them a non-profit for 10 years and then a company thereafter? Amazon made an intentional decision to re-invest profits, as a gamble that it would lead to greater profits later. That's not refraining from profit, but just operating on a time-scale that isn't quarter to quarter.