Steel mill polluted town as Romney firm profited

[manimal]

Corporations are organizations with specific protections and advantages granted by the state that an individual does not possess. You're a sole proprietor? Then you're personally on the hook for anything your company does. Incorporate? Suddenly you have the magical protection of limited liability to protect your personal assets, so go hog wild and fuck over anybody and anything you want. It's OK, you're not personally liable.

Want to see the free market fix itself? End limited liability. Let injured parties go after shareholders beyond their investment.

This


good post

 

[dank69]

Corporations are organizations with specific protections and advantages granted by the state that an individual does not possess. You're a sole proprietor? Then you're personally on the hook for anything your company does. Incorporate? Suddenly you have the magical protection of limited liability to protect your personal assets, so go hog wild and fuck over anybody and anything you want. It's OK, you're not personally liable.

Want to see the free market fix itself? End limited liability. Let injured parties go after shareholders beyond their investment.

Sounds good until you invent a widget, stick a warning label on it telling people not to use it a certain way, they use it that way anyway and then sue you into oblivion.

 

[nehalem256]

Sounds good until you invent a widget, stick a warning label on it telling people not to use it a certain way, they use it that way anyway and then sue you into oblivion.

Or until you realize that you are a shareholder through your 401K, and you end up being sued for something a company did.

 

[cybrsage]

I think the purpose of this thread is to try and make people hate Romney because a steel mill pollutes. It has failed to do so.

 

[Franz316]

Want to see the free market fix itself? End limited liability. Let injured parties go after shareholders beyond their investment.

This would go a long way to making things better. A free market MUST have accountability and the threat of complete failure in order to succeed. The idea of corporations runs contrary to what is actually needed. Since the people running these corporations are not liable to for their actions what you get is mass injustice and short term decisions that are severely detrimental to society as a whole.

 

[Matt1970]

Companies routinely lose vast quantities of money before they go out of business while the owners make out like bandits.

I am no bankruptcy expert but from what I understand is they can go after any assets you have acquired within the last 5 years.

 

[BoberFett]

Or until you realize that you are a shareholder through your 401K, and you end up being sued for something a company did.

That's not necessarily a bad thing. The 401k system is just more government encouraged stupidity. The casino we call Wall Street should be ended. Shares should be investments, not bets on a roulette wheel. Nobody buys into companies they investigate anymore, with products or services they believe in. It's all about the immediate profit, pump and dump, and our society is crumbling from that short term mentality.

 

[crownjules]

I am no bankruptcy expert but from what I understand is they can go after any assets you have acquired within the last 5 years.

Yes. But the individuals are protected in a LLC (corporation). It's only those assets belonging to the company that can be liquidated. So if Mr. CEO has a handsome payment of $5M/year during his tenure of running the ABC Corp into the ground, none of that money is recoverable.

 

[BoberFett]

I am no bankruptcy expert but from what I understand is they can go after any assets you have acquired within the last 5 years.

Yes, a bankruptcy judge could go after the owners assets. While he's at it can throw Brer Rabbit in the briar patch, too.