this post was submitted on 09 Dec 2024
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You can't be a CEO of lots of these companies and act ethically.
Like: legally.
They have a legal fiduciary duty to maximize profits for shareholders. That trumps everything else, including the lives of customers and employees.
One thing to note: that hasn't always been the case. This is something that can change.
It really started in the late 1970s with the Friedman Doctrine.
I'm trying to find the story I listened to about this on NPR a few years ago, but it essentially discussed how this doctrine was taken up after the stagflation in the 1970s (particularly as Reagan was heavily influenced by Milton Friedman). The main point was that it seemed like the traditional economic system was collapsing at that time, and Friedman's ideas argued that it was because businesses were not focused enough on profits. Instead, many businesses were trying to be part of a broader community and work on doing things that were good for the public. Friedman's idea was that this was too economically inefficient and that a businesses only ethical obligation should be to make money for the shareholders, and that the shareholders could decide for themselves on how too help the public.
This went over very well with business leaders, and it helped ushered in the Gordon Gecko era of unironic "greed is good".