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>> businesses exist at the pleasure of the people and their elected representatives As one noted politician famously said: "Corporations are people". The issu
by sandworm101 2y ago
>> businesses exist at the pleasure of the people and their elected representatives
As one noted politician famously said: "Corporations are people". The issue is that soo much of US jurisprudence has granted corporate entities all the rights of personhood. The only thing they cannot yet do is vote, but that too will come. They are certainly today allowed to vote with their wallets by financially supporting candidates.
Part of this issue is in turn tied to how so many powerful people in the US cloak themselves in corporate status. Taylor Swift exists are a person, but all her money flows through her corporation. Trump exists as a person, but all his property is held by his corporations. Some of this is a game to avoid taxation but it is also used to shield people from liabilities. So such powerful people take any attack on corporate personhood very personally.
- trollbridge 2y agoA rather key difference is that people who break the law can and do get put in prison. Whereas consequences and penalties for corporations seem to be nonexistent. An obvious solution would be to revoke limited liability for a corporation, converting it into a general partnership… shareholders could either abandon or sell their shares, and ones who remain would assume both liability and control over the corporation. (Imagine something like this at Boeing.) Limited liability is a privilege, not a right, bestowed by state governments.
- samatman 2y agoRevoking the charter is in fact an option, however seldom it's invoked, but it's not actually necessary. Courts can, and do, pierce the corporate veil, either criminally prosecuting responsible parties or holding them to full liability for corporate action. Corporate personhood is a useful fiction, but it's just that, a legal fiction.