> ...we need businesses and executives to value purpose alongside profit.
Profit is purpose. Profit means the value of the outputs of your business exceeds the value of its inputs. It means you've added something to society, it means you've provided a service to the public. It means when people actually have to choose what's important to them they value what your business has done for them.[0]
> ...where businesses...don’t just take from society but truly give back and have a positive impact.
See above.
I don't know why people think this thought process is new. Read The Road To Serfdom by Hayek. It was written in the 1940's about why these ideas don't work.
The free market is the best invention we know of for a society to express what it actually wants and to achieve those goals. Without it you have a small group of enlightened elites deciding what it is that people want.
> Americans overwhelmingly say C.E.O.s should take the lead on economic and social challenges, and employees, investors and customers increasingly seek out companies that share their values....When government is unable or unwilling to act, business should not wait.
No. We don't want businesses to become political entities. If the problem is businesses aren't using their power for good, the solution isn't to give them even more power. That's too close to Fascism.
This whole essay is an argument that businesses need more social power and governments need more financial power. The trade-off is an increase in power inequality (because we're giving the powerful even more power) to decrease financial inequality. At the same time we'd probably take on massive dead-weight losses from abandoning the profit motive which is essential for our economy to function. That looks like a bad deal to me.
Profit is purpose. Profit means the value of the outputs of your business exceeds the value of its inputs. It means you've added something to society, it means you've provided a service to the public. It means when people actually have to choose what's important to them they value what your business has done for them.[0]
> ...where businesses...don’t just take from society but truly give back and have a positive impact.
See above.
I don't know why people think this thought process is new. Read The Road To Serfdom by Hayek. It was written in the 1940's about why these ideas don't work.
The free market is the best invention we know of for a society to express what it actually wants and to achieve those goals. Without it you have a small group of enlightened elites deciding what it is that people want.
> Americans overwhelmingly say C.E.O.s should take the lead on economic and social challenges, and employees, investors and customers increasingly seek out companies that share their values....When government is unable or unwilling to act, business should not wait.
No. We don't want businesses to become political entities. If the problem is businesses aren't using their power for good, the solution isn't to give them even more power. That's too close to Fascism.
This whole essay is an argument that businesses need more social power and governments need more financial power. The trade-off is an increase in power inequality (because we're giving the powerful even more power) to decrease financial inequality. At the same time we'd probably take on massive dead-weight losses from abandoning the profit motive which is essential for our economy to function. That looks like a bad deal to me.
There is historical precedent for societies accepting power inequality to the extent of dictatorship in the name of ending the ills of capitalism. It hasn't worked well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dictatorship_of_the_proletaria...
[0] - Yes, you can also steal. That's why capitalism exists within a legal framework.