In America, we are so used to corporations that there is a general belief that corporations have been around forever, and further to the point, are beneficial for Americans. Perhaps corporations are beneficial, but they certainly haven’t been around forever, for corporations are artificial constructs of the state, subject to the laws of the state, and created through the expressed permission of the state, signifying that what the state has so created, they also have the right to uncreate or modify, should a corporation behave in a way and manner that is inimical to society. Yet, how few corporations, if any, are ever legislated out of existence, as opposed to the capitalist market itself putting some of them into receivership, or the filing of bankruptcy by a given corporation, because it cannot pay what it owes for damages done to the environment or society or for bad business practices.
Presently, there are a multitude of corporations that have existed for well past the average lifespan of a human being, and each year, there are a significant number of corporations that earn profits that well exceed the earnings of any individual taxpayer, no matter how rich. So too, while human beings are subject to eventually departing this world, when their body no longer can function, and therefore their estate, is passed on per their wishes to a foundation, or heirs, or charity – we do not find the same criteria affecting a corporation, which continues to ply its trade, year after year, and decade after decade. Perhaps this is a good thing, but it has to be recognized that for humans, there will inevitably be that day of reckoning, but apparently for many a corporation, this day of judgment can be postponed, seemingly indefinitely, and therein lies the rub.
To believe that it is good for society, that certain corporations continue to grow and to accumulate massive amounts of wealth, without there ever being an end time, when that corporation will have to face the music, is misguided, for the greater the accumulation of capital into the hands of corporations, the greater is the incentive for that corporation to do what it considers it has to do, to continue to profit, ad nauseam. In other words, corporations are in the business of making money and of returning thereby to their stockholders and directors as much profit as they can extract through the business enterprise that they are in. This signifies that what motivates a given corporation isn’t going to necessarily be what’s good for society, but rather it’s going to be what is good for that corporation.
In a construct in which lots and lots of money is going to equate to power, it has to be admitted that corporations have the most money, and therefore can utilize that money and their position to exert their power, so that what is good for their business, becomes the clarion call of seemingly what a significant percentage of American governance believes is good for the country, even when it is not. So too, in the sure knowledge that there doesn’t appear to ever be a judgment day for corporations, signifies that, unlike humans, corporations do not have a conscience, which is why they need to be regulated in a far more robust way, or else they will essentially run riot over our democratic institutions.