It's Fixed!!!Follow

It was an unfair question. It starts with the premise that private companies have some kind of obligation to spend their money on what you want them to spend it on, and further that spending money on "political activism" is somehow automatically at ends with spending it "creating more jobs". If a company can make more money by hiring more people, it will. That decision isn't capricious, or political. If, by lobbying government, it can prevent laws from being passed which will hurt their bottom line, and thus allow them to hire more people, they'll do it. Said activism benefits both the company *and* the people they employ.




And yet, you mentioned companies. You singled them out as though somehow them getting involved in politics is "wrong", but not anyone else. I could just as easily argue that all those non-profit "community organizations" which take money from donations and then spend it on political activism could instead spend that money on soup kitchens and loans to small businesses to help the community members directly. Yet I don't see you complaining about them, either.



Except that they become rich by providing a good or service to the public, which the public freely chooses to use. They overwhelmingly do this via employment. Thus, their profit motive helps all of us. It helps the people they employ, and it helps the consumers by providing them a better product. And if the company does things which the public doesn't like, the public can boycott them. Can we boycott the government? I'm much much more concerned about government power and influence than private companies getting wealthy.

What does a union do? It increases the cost of labor, thus increasing the cost of the goods and services they provide. And they do this with a virtual monopoly in the areas where they exist. Public employee unions don't have *any* competition at all. And they're funded by taxpayer dollars. And the unions get a piece of that. And they spend it lobbying for even more support for the union.

If we're going to talk about political activism which is negative in effect, what the hell can be said about a process where a group of politicians increase funding for some public sector jobs, which in turn enriches the union, which then turns around and spends that increased money supporting the issues and campaigns of the very politicians who just gave them that money? It's about as corrupt as can be, yet almost no one talks about it.

When a private corporation lobbies the government, the end result is almost always going to be positive for everyone else. When public unions do, it's almost always going to be negative. So yeah. It's relevant to point this out.



But what's good for business is good for America, so we still end out in the same place. Are you trying to argue that a law which decreases corporate profits will somehow magically result in increased hiring by that corporation? How exactly do you think that works? When you make the people who hire people less wealthy, you really only hurt the people they might have hired. Do you honestly think it works some other way? If so, how about you explain why?

Edited, Sep 23rd 2010 1:14pm by gbaji

They're in business to make a profit. However, overwhelmingly, the route to higher profits involves increased hiring abusing your current employees, better products advertising, and lower costs quality for consumers.

Where were you and your "Excluded middle!" when someone suggested that companies can either spend money hiring people, or spend it on political activism?

It also doesn't apply here. Are you saying that we're better off if those industries are *not* healthy and successful?

They're not in business to "help people". They're in business to make a profit.

And those conditions almost always occur as a result of government intervention, not because of a lack of it (excepting anti-trust legislation of course).

If no one can afford their products, how do they make profits? Seriously. Think it through.

Sure. But in the grand scheme of things "companies" are pretty minor players in the political activism landscape. It's unfair to focus on them, while ignoring the others.

And let's not forget the free speech aspect to this. It's a bit more complex than what you're implying. I agree there are some problems, but they aren't that simple, and they're absolutely not so one-sided as you suggest.



I'd suggest that the degree to which that is true today is not really any different to the degree to which it was true back during the founding of this nation.



Because I expressed an opinion that you don't agree with? Take things a bit personally, do ya?

And we got to that state because we increased government involvement in our health care system.

Wait. "Free speech" applies to companies?

Ash,



You cover people poorly in western europe. And all the new fangled technology/medicines you get to use you don't think europeans developed it now do you? And you are right if rich people need to actually get something done they can always fly to america to get the best care.

I challenge you to show me one hospital in the US that will deny care to someone who goes to the ER with a bullet wound, or stabbing, or whatever.

Look at the current US housing industry if you need an example of what happens when govn get's involved in a major industry.