8 ms·

Corporate fines just end up being passed on to workers who had nothing to do with the decision. "We had to (lay off 10% of our workforce|cut worker pay by 10%|e

Corporate fines just end up being passed on to workers who had nothing to do with the decision. "We had to (lay off 10% of our workforce|cut worker pay by 10%|etc.) because of these unfair fines." Corporations aren't people--they can't make the decision to do unethical things. Yes, I understand the law, I'm saying the law is incorrect. People do unethical things, and people should be held responsible for their actions. Fining decision-makers might be an acceptable alternative to jail time, as long as the minimum fine is some sort of multiple of profits gained, to prevent criminals from just figuring a slap on the wrist fine into their decision-making math.

pydry 3y ago
>Corporate fines just end up being passed on to workers who had nothing to do with the decision. "We had to (lay off 10% of our workforce|cut worker pay by 10%|etc.) because of these unfair fines." This is like "if you raise the minimum wage we'll only have to lay people off" which is equally self serving and utterly, completely wrong. Employees dont pay. Shareholders pay. If they could have fired 1 employee and collected a bit of extra profit they would already have done so.
- kerkeslager 3y ago
  > If they could have fired 1 employee and collected a bit of extra profit they would already have done so. But they couldn't pay workers less or decrease workforce, because they needed those workers to execute the unethical business plan. They weren't waiting for a fine to cut workers, they were waiting for the cash cow to stop producing milk to cut workers who were necessary to keep the cash cow going.
  - Kinrany 3y ago
    That's a completely different argument, and a worse one at that.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
crazygringo 3y ago
> Corporate fines just end up being passed on to workers No they don't, they get passed on to shareholders. The market cap of the company decreases by the amount of the fine (plus any predicted future effect of the lost money) and the stock price goes down to reflect that. If the company could get away with paying workers less or decreasing its workforce in order to boost profitability, it already would have. It's not waiting for a fine to justify doing so.
- pavel_lishin 3y ago
  In the parlance of an old internet meme, "why not both"? Also, they _are_ cutting employees. There have been a lot of layoffs recently, and some of them have explicitly stated it'd not because they can't afford those employees.
  - crazygringo 3y ago
    Because that's not how it works, it isn't both. Yes HP is laying off employees just like pretty much every other large tech company right now. Which shows you it has nothing to do with fines, and rather everything to do with industry-wide overexpansion during COVID and high interest rates now.
    - mcny 3y ago
      > Because that's not how it works Exactly! I don’t know how to deal with people who talk about the economy in terms of a perfect competition free market where all participants have full knowledge and are all equal in terms of power. If a physicist talked in terms of zero friction or spherical cows, we would laugh them off and never listen to them again. And yet people continue to talk about the economy with these assumptions that make zero friction and spherical cows look like practical applied physics.
      - WalterBright 3y ago
        I don't know where the requirement of full knowledge became part of the definition of a free market. Because it isn't true. Another word for lack of knowledge is "risk". The amount of risk is factored into the price of everything you buy and sell. For example, a name brand item sells for a higher price than a generic item because the name brand carries with it less risk for the buyer.
amluto 3y ago
If you can run a successful business by selling $100 objects that cost $20 each to make and result in an average of $90 of fines per sale, and make it up by mistreating your workers, I applaud you.
- DanHulton 3y ago
  Mistreatment happens in a variety of ways, some of them, yes, financial. These can be, but are not limited to: - Layoffs - Demotion - Canceling of raises - Canceling of promotions - Reduction in perks and other business benefits - etc
- pengaru 3y ago
  Does being Too Big To Fail and getting government bailouts count as successful?
- LorenPechtel 3y ago
  But if they could mistreat their workers they would so anyway independent of the object in question. $100 sale - $20 costs - $90 fine = -$10 per unit. Nobody's going to do that unless having that in people's hands makes them money somehow. (We have seen that with game systems--sell at a loss and make it up on the games.)
usernew 3y ago
They do not get "passed on to the workers." That's not how that works - not how any of that works. A business needs a certain number of workers for a certain output. Those workers need to be paid a market amount for their skillset, for the amount of output. If the company does not have the funds to pay them - due to fines or competition or any other reason, the company lays off workers and reduces output and revenue - giving those sales to competitors, or goes out of business. Yes, if the solution to "we broke printers" is to refund every single affected sale, the company will lay off workers, reduce output, and close down if that happens enough. Their competition will increase output to fill the unmet demand, and hire workers. That literally is the point of the fine, and is a good thing, not a bad thing.

pydry 3y ago

>Corporate fines just end up being passed on to workers who had nothing to do with the decision. "We had to (lay off 10% of our workforce|cut worker pay by 10%|etc.) because of these unfair fines." This is like "if you raise the minimum wage we'll only have to lay people off" which is equally self serving and utterly, completely wrong. Employees dont pay. Shareholders pay. If they could have fired 1 employee and collected a bit of extra profit they would already have done so.

kerkeslager 3y ago
> If they could have fired 1 employee and collected a bit of extra profit they would already have done so. But they couldn't pay workers less or decrease workforce, because they needed those workers to execute the unethical business plan. They weren't waiting for a fine to cut workers, they were waiting for the cash cow to stop producing milk to cut workers who were necessary to keep the cash cow going.
- Kinrany 3y ago
  That's a completely different argument, and a worse one at that.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

crazygringo 3y ago

> Corporate fines just end up being passed on to workers No they don't, they get passed on to shareholders. The market cap of the company decreases by the amount of the fine (plus any predicted future effect of the lost money) and the stock price goes down to reflect that. If the company could get away with paying workers less or decreasing its workforce in order to boost profitability, it already would have. It's not waiting for a fine to justify doing so.

pavel_lishin 3y ago
In the parlance of an old internet meme, "why not both"? Also, they _are_ cutting employees. There have been a lot of layoffs recently, and some of them have explicitly stated it'd not because they can't afford those employees.
- crazygringo 3y ago
  Because that's not how it works, it isn't both. Yes HP is laying off employees just like pretty much every other large tech company right now. Which shows you it has nothing to do with fines, and rather everything to do with industry-wide overexpansion during COVID and high interest rates now.
  - mcny 3y ago
    > Because that's not how it works Exactly! I don’t know how to deal with people who talk about the economy in terms of a perfect competition free market where all participants have full knowledge and are all equal in terms of power. If a physicist talked in terms of zero friction or spherical cows, we would laugh them off and never listen to them again. And yet people continue to talk about the economy with these assumptions that make zero friction and spherical cows look like practical applied physics.
    - WalterBright 3y ago
      I don't know where the requirement of full knowledge became part of the definition of a free market. Because it isn't true. Another word for lack of knowledge is "risk". The amount of risk is factored into the price of everything you buy and sell. For example, a name brand item sells for a higher price than a generic item because the name brand carries with it less risk for the buyer.

amluto 3y ago

If you can run a successful business by selling $100 objects that cost $20 each to make and result in an average of $90 of fines per sale, and make it up by mistreating your workers, I applaud you.

DanHulton 3y ago
Mistreatment happens in a variety of ways, some of them, yes, financial. These can be, but are not limited to: - Layoffs - Demotion - Canceling of raises - Canceling of promotions - Reduction in perks and other business benefits - etc
pengaru 3y ago
Does being Too Big To Fail and getting government bailouts count as successful?
LorenPechtel 3y ago
But if they could mistreat their workers they would so anyway independent of the object in question. $100 sale - $20 costs - $90 fine = -$10 per unit. Nobody's going to do that unless having that in people's hands makes them money somehow. (We have seen that with game systems--sell at a loss and make it up on the games.)

usernew 3y ago

They do not get "passed on to the workers." That's not how that works - not how any of that works. A business needs a certain number of workers for a certain output. Those workers need to be paid a market amount for their skillset, for the amount of output. If the company does not have the funds to pay them - due to fines or competition or any other reason, the company lays off workers and reduces output and revenue - giving those sales to competitors, or goes out of business. Yes, if the solution to "we broke printers" is to refund every single affected sale, the company will lay off workers, reduce output, and close down if that happens enough. Their competition will increase output to fill the unmet demand, and hire workers. That literally is the point of the fine, and is a good thing, not a bad thing.