Comment by komali2
7 hours ago
> If a corporation wants to build electric cars to fight climate change or build housing to reduce housing scarcity, that doesn't make it "bad" -- it's good, and you don't want the government impeding that when somebody wants to do it.
It's good so long as it's profitable and grows. The market determines good and bad, nothing else. Companies must grow indefinitely or their stock price drops, any earnings announcement makes this obvious, even positive growth earnings might cause a stock price drop if the earnings growth wasn't large enough. Flat earnings, with a margin increase? Stock price devaluation, see Microsoft / Xbox. The word is right there, value. The value of a company is determined by its market price (or theoretical market price if it's still private), and nothing else. The market value of its shares are the final word.
Sure, companies might occasionally do good things, but that core definition of value under capitalism doesn't change.
You're still stuck on publicly-traded corporations.
Try one of these. A non-profit gets a million dollars in donations to build new housing with the model of selling it into the market and using the proceeds to build even more. They still have to comply with all the laws, so you don't want the laws to adversarially impede its humanitarian mission to improve housing affordability and reduce homelessness, right?
> They still have to comply with all the laws, so you don't want the laws to adversarially impede its humanitarian mission to improve housing affordability and reduce homelessness, right?
I do want the laws to ensure that the buildings have fire escapes and no asbestos...
Non profits can, apparently, convert to for-profit ones, or be bought, or be corrupt funnels of government contract money to for-profit corporations.
These are arguments for improving and simplifying regulations, but not arguments against the idea that there should be an entity the represents nothing other than the needs of the constituents (the government) that will enforce rules on entities that wish to extract value from constituents (corporations). Non profit corps are attempts to exist within that system while playing by the rules but it doesn't change the fact that we still need the rules to control the hyperfauna wandering around.
> I do want the laws to ensure that the buildings have fire escapes and no asbestos...
The classic retreat into the subset of the rules that make sense.
But do you also want to ensure that they're no more than two stories tall and supply housing for no more than one family per lot?
> Non profits can, apparently, convert to for-profit ones, or be bought, or be corrupt funnels of government contract money to for-profit corporations.
Which one of these is the concern justifying that a house of a particular size not have a finished basement?
> These are arguments for improving and simplifying regulations, but not arguments against the idea that there should be an entity the represents nothing other than the needs of the constituents (the government) that will enforce rules on entities that wish to extract value from constituents (corporations).
You're back to that assumption that the government represents nothing other than the needs of the constituents. That one's the broken one.
The government has a monopoly on force and anyone who seeks power will work to capture it. It's not a loyal pet and its teeth have blood on them.
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