Corporations Are Not Friends, People - The Atlantic - 0 views
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Corporations are people, my friend,” Romney replied. He was jeered in the crowd, and jeered even more by Democrats afterward. “I don’t care how many times you try to explain it,” Barack Obama said on the stump. “Corporations aren’t people. People are people.”
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In arguing that companies should absolutely continue to donate money to politicians, but also that they should stay out of politics,
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What these politicians are expressing is the fury of people who thought they had a deal, and have learned that they don’t, at least not on the old terms. The old arrangement was simple: The fiscally conservative wing of the Republican Party would push for lighter regulation, lower corporate taxes, and lower taxes on the high earners who ran corporations. In return, the corporations would cut generous checks to Republicans and remain circumspectly quiet about the culture-war issues that the social-conservative wing of the party cared about.
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McConnell embraced the tortured position that money, and only money, is speech—and that actual speech is not speech.
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The Kentuckian argued that money was speech, and limitations on donations—even requirements to disclose—infringed on free speech.
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life—the peaceful transfer of power comes to mind—it is a casualty of the Trump era. In the early half of his presidency, Donald Trump pursued some projects that solidified the traditional bond between the GOP and business, such as slashing taxes, but also others that divided the old allies, including protectionist policies on trade and personally intervening to bully companies.
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Last year, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, usually a stalwart supporter of Republicans, endorsed some Democrats, and it forcefully condemned Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election.
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Meanwhile, a decades-long consensus that publicly held that companies should, above all, do whatever they could to maximize short-term shareholder value began to soften. In 2019, the Business Roundtable, a leading trade association, released new guidance that said corporations should “push for an economy that serves all Americans,” in Chairman Jamie Dimon’s words, by investing in communities and employees, dealing ethically with suppliers, and considering longer-term returns.
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Now with voting laws at the center of national politics, corporations are speaking out. MLB moved the All-Star Game, Coca-Cola and Delta blasted the Georgia law, and other executives have objected to the law and other bills under consideration elsewhere. To critics, this is riskily divisive. Echoing a famous Michael Jordan line, McConnell complained that Republicans drink Coke and fly too.
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But these companies are responsive to many groups, and just because their stances don’t directly affect revenue and profits, that doesn’t mean these aren’t business decisions. Corporations are balancing the demands of shareholders, customers, and employees, as well as the positions of their own executives,
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Companies may also calculate that the long-term costs of being on the wrong side of social-justice issues, or the wrong side of an ascendant liberal, diverse population, outweigh the short-term risks of Republican backlash and boycotts.
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In short, what McConnell calls “blackmail” is just free enterprise at work. These companies may or may not be acting in their long-term best interests—corporations make mistaken bets about the future all the time—but they are acting rationally.
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The minority leader is realizing that the deal Republicans had with big corporations wasn’t personal; it was just business. A tax break can buy you a lot of things, but it doesn’t buy love.
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In taking these stances on big social issues, these corporations are acting in a majoritarian manner. But no one should conclude that they are progressive. Even as big business enters into a temporary alliance with Democrats on voting rights, many of its captains are fighting back against the plan President Joe Biden announced Wednesday to raise corporate tax rates.
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American government would probably be healthier if more politicians asked—for whatever reason—why they are so willing to accept corporations’ arguments on taxes, regulation, and antitrust. Corporations may be people, my friends. But corporations are not friends, people.