Corporations are people

Ha, no idea Mitt Romney was on phuks.

Kidding aside, I agree. Most regulations are artificial barriers, and only work to benefit big business. Crony Capitalism.

[–] Siedge [OP] 3 points (+3|-0)

This made me laugh for a solid 30 seconds. Have my upvote

[–] PhuksNewfag 3 points (+3|-0)

I really despise what google became and yet I use many of their products. It's often times because of minor things, like google knows exactly that when I search for a coding term I want to see results relevant to C# whereas other search engines may give results for Java, PHP etc...

If companies are people google is the creepy pedophile that groomed you since a very young age (when they still had "do no evil" as a motto) and who gives you free candy and free other stuff while grossly violating your boundaries.

[–] Siedge [OP] 1 points (+1|-0)

Switched to DuckDuckGo and other services quite a while back, have not missed them. Google is very very creepy and I'll be glad when they are a relic of the past.

[–] antikaon 2 points (+2|-0)

FYI: Soylent Green is also people.

[–] [Deleted] 2 points (+2|-0)

I am also a part owner in a corporation, but I have to disagree with you. At least to a degree.
While yes, corporations are made up of people, they are legal entities created to shield management, etc. from a certain amount of legal responsibility. Legal entities are not the same as flesh-and-blood humans.

My $0.02 on the matter...

[–] CDanger 0 points (+0|-0)

Corporations also seem to get the favorable benefits of being "persons" without the downsides as you point out. They are shielded, and you won't see a corporation imprisoned or given the death penalty even after engaging in fraud. If anything they are masterful creations for shielding anybody from responsibility when fraud occurs.

[–] [Deleted] 1 points (+1|-0)

Agreed. While they are necessary, they are not and should not be considered equal to humans.

[–] InnocentBystander 2 points (+6|-4)

Corporations are not people.
People have responsibilities and can be held responsible for their actions. A corporations only duty is to profit, by any means.

A market is not regulated by consumers. Consumers will go with the cheapest/easiest option. The educated consumer you speak of is a myth. Take Equifax as an example, they leaked millions of peoples information, but will continue to operate fine, and will not make any adjustments to their practices except what they are regulated to change. Free-market can't stop them.
An unrestricted free-market has always led to monopolies and abuse. No exceptions.

Every successful market has been regulated.

When you have a bad friend you don't ask the government to make them stop doing something.

When that bad friend gets out of line and begins to hurt people, yes you do call the government. The police division.

My point being corporations are people

But they are not. They have different need, goals, and responsibilities. A corp. is made from people, but isn't one.
We have laws to say what is acceptable behaviour from humans, why wouldn't we have the same for corps.?

but it's hard for them to grow as we put more and more regulations on things

Over-regulation is a not a reason to get rid of all regulation.

Where I'm from they've made a new rule on licenses for crane operators over a certain weight limit

Cranes are incredibly dangerous. They fall over every day, even with a high rate of regulation. Take a look at crane statistics in unregulated states, they are killers. Not just the operators, but bystanders getting killed.
Have you seen the electric grid and other infrastructure in unregulated countries? I think you might change your mind if you did.
Crane operators don't pay those fees (unless they are independents who own their business) the company they work for does.
That's not a lot of money for a crane outfit.

[–] Siedge [OP] 4 points (+4|-0)

Your argument is that educated consumers are a myth? I feel like that falls apart really quickly. When you argue that people are too stupid to figure things out on their own you will find people don't take to kindly too that.

Also that bottom argument of "The company pays it" is the issue and arguing that it's not a lot of money for a large company.. You are reinforcing everything I am arguing here. You are making my argument look really good. You are saying that small businesses and startups shouldn't exist. Everyone should just get a normal job with that mindset. That's not what a lot of people want to do, innovation happens when you allow as many people as possible into markets, regulations don't hurt big business they hurt small businesses.

[–] E-werd 2 points (+2|-0)

Also that bottom argument of "The company pays it" is the issue and arguing that it's not a lot of money for a large company.

I think the point he's trying to make here is that the license acts as a sort of filter for companies that can afford to do business safely. If you can't afford the license, there's a good chance you might be having to cut corners elsewhere. It's a cost of doing business. Lives are at risk and everyone needs to do their due diligence.

Your argument is that educated consumers are a myth?

Nobody shops at Walmart because they think it's a fine, upstanding company. They shop there because it's cheaper. They generated enough sales that they have the ability to strong-arm suppliers into selling cheaper to them. The suppliers know that Walmart is the biggest player in the game and, if they want to stay afloat, they need to play ball. Meanwhile, other retailers can't beat Walmart's pricing because they don't have the sales volume to get the same discounts as Walmart--and that's exactly why they don't have the sales volume. It's a never-ending cycle that is killing companies like JC Penney, Macy's, Sears/Kmart, Toys 'R Us, and more.

Consumers could have kept up their old shopping habits and killed off Walmart and prevented this monopolistic mess, but we'll always go for the cheapest deal. Whether it's stupidity or a lack of means is questionable, but employees aren't paid much at Walmart and the higher-paying retail jobs are disappearing because of Walmart's dominance so you decide where the root is.

When you argue that people are too stupid to figure things out on their own you will find people don't take to kindly too that.

Public opinion, especially of themselves, is often inconsistent with reality. You can feel how you want about this, but stupid is as stupid does. We're still dumb opportunistic animals at our core.

[–] Siedge [OP] 1 points (+1|-0)

With the crane situation, when I used to run a crane, it would have been very very very difficult for me to injure anyone doing what I did. In-fact the only possible person to be injured would have been me. Charging multiple thousands of dollars doesn't prove someone is going to be safe. If the goal was to be safe it wouldn't cost thousands of dollars to take the test. Theres multiple fees, first you have to pay an approval fee (Which is over a thousand dollars on it's own) this fee is to get approved to take the exam. Then you pay for the exam, which costs per each time you take it. Explain why you would need to pay an approval fee if safety is what's being considered here? (Plus crane related fatalities in America is so low as it is, this isn't something that will lower the rate of fatalities in-fact because the license just limits the size of truck you can run, I imagine we will see an increase of fatalities due to people trying to lift bigger things with trucks not rated for those things.

I also don't believe the reason companies like Walmart are able to get so much power is because people are stupid, I attribute most of it to the odd information era we've been in. I don't see Walmart being around too much longer either..

Anyway my point being most the times these regulations are not made by some wonderful guy who wants to see everyone safe. It's by politicians who get paid by large corporations to make sure there's less competition.

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[–] InnocentBystander 0 points (+1|-1)

Edited

Your argument is that educated consumers are a myth?

Yes.

I feel like that falls apart really quickly.

How? You haven't refuted it. Tell me how consumers would have fixed Equifax, or how consumers prevented Microsoft fro getting a monopoly (hint, gov regulations made it so Microsoft bailed out Apple). There are an unlimited number of examples of large corps having to be reigned in by regulations because consumers don't care.

When you argue that people are too stupid to figure things out on their own

I never said that. I said they don't care. It's an example of 'Tragedy of the commons'.

argument of "The company pays it" is the issue and arguing that it's not a lot of money for a large company

That's not what I said, and that is not my argument.
My point was that cranes are very dangerous and lack of regulations leads to many bystander fatalities.

You are saying that small businesses and startups shouldn't exist.

No I did not. You're not being rational at this point.
Please try to stay calm, I don't have much patience for people who get offended by opposing views.

[–] Phukin_Alduin 2 points (+2|-0)

Edited

As a longtime fellow business owner I agree with a lot of this. There's a caricature of the greedy sort of manipulative dirtbag business owners, but in my experience those guys don't last long. And the most successful people are often the kindest, most generous and mild-mannered people you'll ever meet.

And yeah, generally speaking regulations don't hurt big businesses. They just help them by preventing competition. Sometimes this is very blatant (like requiring million dollar licenses for taxis, or outlawing airbnb in cities where hotel owners are influential). But a lot of times it's probably well meaning and still accomplishes the same thing (like regulating the healthcare industry until the only ones standing charge hundreds of thousands of dollars for a few days care).

Not that hurting big businesses would even be a good thing. Economies run on business. Everyone's life is made better by capitalism, and I do mean everyone. Far better to be poor in a rich country than poor in a poor country. What people really hate is cronyism, which itself is really antithetical to capitalism.

[–] CDanger 0 points (+0|-0)

You're right about the local smallbusiness owner being a down-to-earth human. In scenarios like this where you reputation matters, the unethical businessman won't succeed. But large corporations favor a completely different type of individual. There is a reason literal psychopaths reach the top of Fortune 500 corporations. Business conducted at that scale is impersonal and focuses only on profit--the CEO won't care if the VP of operations screws over a small supplier if that saves the company $10m.

[–] Phukin_Alduin 0 points (+0|-0)

Edited

I'm not sure where that came from about the psychopaths as CEOs. Like, how would you even know that? It's not that I doubt it. If a psychopath is focused I'm sure they could accomplish a lot. All being a psychopath really means is you don't care about other people, so surely that's an advantage for a lot of situations. But like, psychopaths as CEOs just sounds like something somebody on the internet made up. There's no way to study that.

Aside from that, I've met some absurdly rich people before. Like Mitt Romney rich. They're not usually what you expect. You think they must just be killers, just kicking ass and taking names left and right, doing whatever they want. But they're either genuinely nice people or they're really really good at faking it. And they had no reason to fake it with me, I was nothing. I'm still nothing compared to them and their sphere of influence, and made no illusions of importance myself.

Or maybe it's just a midwestern thing. The NY elite are probably killers.

[–] CDanger 0 points (+0|-0)

I'm not sure where that came from about the psychopaths as CEOs. Like, how would you even know that?

This is a fairly well studied area of psychology. From a quick search I found this https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/13/1-in-5-ceos-are-psychopaths-australian-study-finds/

Basically to reach these sort of positions you have to be good at manipulating others (to gain power, perform actions that are beneficial to you, increase your influence, form alliances, don't anger those who could block you, etc). Some of this will have the appearance of being nice.

or they're really really good at faking it

Whether they're "faking" kind of misses the point: they may have treated you nicely, but that is because it is all a game to them, and by acting how they do they manipulate others to achieve their own goals.

I'm not saying every rich person or CEO is a psychopath, but the personality is far more represented in this demographic than perhaps any other because it can succeed in the corporate environment.

[–] Dudicles 1 points (+1|-0)

I don't think it's coincidence that people have been trained to think of any business, regardless of size, when they are lead to think badly of "the evil corporations." In the long run, with the lack of distinction, they're helping big global corporations at the expense of basically every small business. The fact that people immediately look to government to solve all problems is also not coincidence, and considering big government generally runs hand in hand with big business, it's easy to see why the average person has this type of thinking hammered into them until it is practically an instinct.

I found out long ago that the average person on the internet would happily see your company go under simply because you're a business owner or a manager. Doesn't matter if your company doesn't make money, doesn't matter if your salary is less than many other professionals. All that matters is the word(s) "manager" "owner" "business" "corporation" etc. Instinctual attack dogs for big business and government, and they don't even know it.

[–] recon_johnny 1 points (+1|-0)

I thought Soylent Green was people.

Didn't know.

[–] smallpond 1 points (+1|-0)

Edited

I essentially agree with @InnocentBystander 's thoughts here.

A large corporation has a singular objective: profit. If left to its own devices of course it will abuse the market and form a monopoly if it can, because that's how you guarantee profit, and consumers alone have very limited options when fighting against monopolies.

Many businesses are monopolistic in nature: water supply is just one example. If a company takes control of the infrastructure supplying water to your house then pushes the price to extremes, ghosting it is pretty hard to do, and consumers shouldn't be put in that position.

If you want to compare a corporation to a person, I think 'evil' is a fairly useful label. That person's only goal is money, it can rapidly amass fantastic power and influence, and will abuse/manipulate actual people without a second thought to further that goal because it doesn't really have the capacity for secondary objectives. If you let your bad friend become a tyrant and enslave you, you no longer have the option of ending the friendship.

[–] zx1 -2 points (+1|-3)

I would respond, but this seems to be an echo chamber where dissenting thoughts are not tolerated.

[–] Siedge [OP] 2 points (+3|-1)

Edited

Well this is a response, honestly regardless if your input is liked or disliked, it's always good to give your thoughts as you never know when someone might see what you've written and go "Wow I've never thought of it that way" and even if you add something to the conversation for one person then you've definitely contributed something

(Plus I wouldn't say it's an echo chamber. The only downvoted views have been a comment saying my views were stupid without adding anything of substance, and one calling people too stupid to decide things for themselves)

[–] zx1 2 points (+2|-0)

Thanks for understanding. In that case, I'll just throw in my two cents to my point of view on the matter.

It may be easy to view corporations as people, however there are a few things that don't add up. First, people are flesh and blood, they have organs and biological components and the ability to think for themselves should they choose to do so. Corporations are structural entities, and while they may have organs for departments, they are not alive so to speak. They are made up of many people at once that can make them seem alive, but neither does it have its own native intelligence, but rather the intelligence of many people congregated together into a morass that represents the company.

Another issue is the precedent set by calling corporations people. Since corporations yield far more power than the average person, this easily leads to a state of corporatocracy where corporations have greater voices than other "people" who then become far more marginalized, and I feel this is not a fair advantage and can lead to abuse. It only encourages the seeking power above all other things, a situation begging for imbalance.

[–] [Deleted] 2 points (+2|-0)

Corporate personhood

[–] TerdWilson -8 points (+1|-9)

yeah well, your point is stupid.

[–] Siedge [OP] 4 points (+4|-0)

Edited

My point of Corporations being made up of people?

Edit: Facts are stupid guys! Wrap it up!

[–] TerdWilson -6 points (+1|-7)

yeah well, now I think you are stupid

My point being corporations are people

[–] E-werd 0 points (+1|-1)

Then make a counter-point, see the post by @InnocentBystander for an example of how this could be done.

Agree or not, a simple insulting comment isn't productive. Why is it stupid?

[–] TerdWilson -1 points (+0|-1)

Edited

dont tell me how to comment . I fucking did, maybe you need to read

I told him its a stupid point, and it isnt a new idea. He then changed his "point" entirely in his second reply to me. there fore I called him stupid.

should I entertain/educate a moron with shitty ideas? if so, I demand payment

I dont think you quite understand who the fuck you are dealing with

[–] E-werd 4 points (+4|-0)

I dont think you quite understand who the fuck you are dealing with

What the fuck did you just fucking type about me, you little bitch? I’ll have you know I graduated top of my class at MIT, and I’ve been involved in numerous secret raids with Anonymous, and I have over 300 confirmed DDoSes. I am trained in online trolling and I’m the top hacker in the entire world. You are nothing to me but just another virus host. I will wipe you the fuck out with precision the likes of which has never been seen before on the Internet, mark my fucking words. You think you can get away with typing that shit to me over the Internet? Think again, fucker. As we chat over IRC I am tracing your IP with my damn bare hands so you better prepare for the storm, maggot. The storm that wipes out the pathetic little thing you call your computer. You’re fucking dead, kid. I can be anywhere, anytime, and I can hack into your files in over seven hundred ways, and that’s just with my bare hands. Not only am I extensively trained in hacking, but I have access to the entire arsenal of every piece of malware ever created and I will use it to its full extent to wipe your miserable ass off the face of the world wide web, you little shit. If only you could have known what unholy retribution your little “clever” comment was about to bring down upon you, maybe you would have held your fucking fingers. But you couldn’t, you didn’t, and now you’re paying the price, you goddamn idiot. I will shit code all over you and you will drown in it. You’re fucking dead, kiddo.

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Corporations are people

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/s/Whatever