3 ms·

> There is nothing wrong with buying and liquidating a company. Sometimes no, but sometimes yes. What about employees, services the company provides to people,

> There is nothing wrong with buying and liquidating a company. Sometimes no, but sometimes yes. What about employees, services the company provides to people, etc.? For example, is it no problem if a PE buys and runs into the ground businesses like nursing homes, hospitals, rental apartments and homes? What about in smaller communities where there is no substitute? Nothing we do is in a vacuum, the domain where economic theories operate. We live in a community, economy, society, and all need to think about how we affect them. If not us, there's nobody else to do it. No person - or fictional corporate entity - is an island.

konschubert 3y ago
You can declare these good public goods and then publicly own and fund them. That works well for some things and not so well for others. If you want a nursing home in a poor, remote community, you probably need to use public money for that. You cannot tell a private owner of a privately-owned nursing home that they should keep losing money year over year. Considering that there are other, profitable nursing homes, maybe there is a systemic problem with this nursing home that cannot be fixed (for example too expensive real estate, bad company culture, ...). I this case, liquidating it and then re-using the assets (employees, buildings, ... ) in other economic endeavours is the right choice for the individual and also for society at large.
- wolverine876 3y ago
  > You can declare these good public goods and then publicly own and fund them. That's the theory (or one theory among many), but it doesn't always work that easily in practice. If you own any for-profit business, you have obligations beyond making money. If you own a nursing home, you have obligations to the residents, their families, the community, etc. > You cannot tell a private owner of a privately-owned nursing home that they should keep losing money year over year. Nobody tells them that. First, the choice isn't follow the (stereotyped) PE route or lose money. Second, your job as a business owner is to make money no matter what the conditions. If as a business owner you accept excuses from yourself (or others) about circumstances, you won't last a month - there are always reasons it can't be done. Your job is to balance and solve all those problems, and make money.

konschubert 3y ago

You can declare these good public goods and then publicly own and fund them. That works well for some things and not so well for others. If you want a nursing home in a poor, remote community, you probably need to use public money for that. You cannot tell a private owner of a privately-owned nursing home that they should keep losing money year over year. Considering that there are other, profitable nursing homes, maybe there is a systemic problem with this nursing home that cannot be fixed (for example too expensive real estate, bad company culture, ...). I this case, liquidating it and then re-using the assets (employees, buildings, ... ) in other economic endeavours is the right choice for the individual and also for society at large.

wolverine876 3y ago
> You can declare these good public goods and then publicly own and fund them. That's the theory (or one theory among many), but it doesn't always work that easily in practice. If you own any for-profit business, you have obligations beyond making money. If you own a nursing home, you have obligations to the residents, their families, the community, etc. > You cannot tell a private owner of a privately-owned nursing home that they should keep losing money year over year. Nobody tells them that. First, the choice isn't follow the (stereotyped) PE route or lose money. Second, your job as a business owner is to make money no matter what the conditions. If as a business owner you accept excuses from yourself (or others) about circumstances, you won't last a month - there are always reasons it can't be done. Your job is to balance and solve all those problems, and make money.