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Originally Posted by Bill O'Rights
Good for you. That's how it should work. If you have a personal problem with the ethics of a company, then simply refuse to do business with them. In the long run, it may not mean jack shit. But, at least it's not your dollar, that you earned, lining their pockets.
That said, I wholeheartedly disagree that any company has an obligation to contribute to the needy. You may choose to reward those companies that opt to do so, with your consumer dollar. But, they are under no obligation to do so. The only obligation that the executive officers of any company has, is to the investors of that company.
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I have to disagree Bill and say that it is a fairly recent phenomenon where companies believe they have NO obligations to anyone but their shareholders.
Henry Ford stated that a company needs to pay their employees enough to afford their product and be able to pay their debts. That way the company would have built in lifelong customers.
It worked.
Hershey, Firestone, Goodyear, Tappan, Westinghouse, US Steel, Hoover, Ohio Brass, etc etc all built housing and sold them to their workers cheaply. The company heirarchies back then believed it was their duty to maintain a thriving community and they did. In doing so they were able to maintain a "homegrown" consumer base that would try out new product and be loyal to the town's biggest employer.
What happened is greed. The unions wanted more, the communities expected more (thus taxes would increase) and in all honesty neither needed more. But the companies had no choice but to give in, however ir destroyed their R&D and caused them to start becoming more expensive and putting people further into a debt status. (Instead of a car costing someone a thousand and them being able to pay cash or have it paid off in a year or so... cars jumped to $5,000 and required 5 year loans.)
Eventually by the late 70's when the recession hit and the first true wave of imports came, the companies by that time were in bad shape and started to crumble. Some crumbled into nothingness, some sold out and merged and some moved. But all were starting to tell communities that they were hurting and it was the community's turn to return the favor by lowering taxes. Some communities listened, some raised taxes even more.
In the 80's Reagan helped weaken the unions and made it possible to outsource and lowered tarrifs. Management at this time still cared about the communities, to some degree but were more worried about self preservation.
Now today,we have allowed the scenario to take a 180. Now, the company heirarchy now longer cares about the community or its employees but only profit and lining their own pockets.
Hence, the communities are truly dying, the employees cannot afford regular living expenses without going into debt and the companies now hold the communities hostage with tax abatements or we move. Thus we see CEO pay in God awful amounts and golden parachutes and upper management not having that past connection to the company.
They want theirs and they want out. They don't care about growth, employees and the community, because they tried that, now it's all about them making money.
What we as a country and as a world society need to do is find middle ground all would be happy with.
Short answer: YES it is very much a corporation's responsibility to help and give back to the community and employee, BUT it is also the community and employee's responsibility to make sure the company stays healthy.
I know I babble but I have lived around it my whole life, I have known as close friends both management and employee families and I have listened to both sides.
My hometown, Mansfield, Ohio, would be far different today had the (Armco, Ohio Brass, Tappan, Westinghouse and so on), union workers and community not been so greedy.
This scenario has played out to where now schools suffer, both parents have to work, kids are in unstable environs because both parents have to work and society itself has changed to "fuck everyone else, I want mine."
We can rebuild and become great again, not only as a nation but the planet as a whole, IF and only IF balance is found and everyone believes and remembers that society can only grow if they give back to the community so that it can grow and acts accordingly.