Corporate personhood

Split from the propose a constitutional amendment thread.

Simple question: should corporations be considered persons? Why or whyt not?

Article on coroporate personhood from The Other Wiki.

edit: can a mod fix my title typo?

edited 26th Mar '11 12:59:28 AM by Acebrock

I'm not entirely certain what issues are at hand—for instance, the Wikipedia article doesn't make it entirely clear in what ways a corporation benefits from having free speech rights rather than, say, having the CEO speak on behalf of the corporation.

From what I can tell, it originally arose from contract making. Which makes some sense to me.

I'm still not entirely clear how this differs from the concept of a "legal person" or why it is specifically corporations that must be denied these rights. Or other collectives (associations charities municipalities etc.) would be denied the same, likewise?

It bothers some people they can donate to political campaigns. It seems reasonable to put a stop to that, but it's really easy to work around that kind of regulation. Otherwise, I don't find anything particularly repugnant about the concept.

It's important to realize that by law, for profit corporations are supposed to work toward making a profit for the shareholder and nothing else. Doing otherwise can get them in trouble, and it's hard to justify spending like that, even when it works. When it does, we're left with a lobby for corporate welfare. Fuck that shit.

edited 27th Mar '11 1:50:22 AM by Roman

Well there's things like the Citizens United ruling, which gives corporations a hell of a lot more voice in politics than the average person can muster. I'd like to see someone portraye that as a good thing

edited 26th Mar '11 4:12:29 PM by Acebrock

: If the corporation is RUN by IDEALISM for TECHOLOGY instead of PROFITS, then nothing bad with having corporations running over people. The problem is that whenever the idealist leaders retire or get into a minority, the company collapses and become something not quite good.
And since humans are rather.... greedy, there is bound to be more profitsearching companies that idealistic ones.
Hence: Case to case situation, but the idealists lose nothing since they never use their "rights" as a "fictional collective identify" to run people over.

An "idealistic" corporation is an oxymoron. They exist to serve their shareholders.

This is not to say you can't have corporations — you just can't have trans-national corporations and free trade.

What sort of organization would I run if I want to change the world for the better, but I acknowledge that doing so requires money, and I'm willing to use corporate-style tactics to get that money?

Well, some corporations are quite idealistic.

A small company run by geeks has a good chance of being run for technology!!! 'S long as a techie can pay the rent and buy booze, nothing bars him from being in business mostly for the thrill of research.

Quite a few startups are more about pushing the boundaries of current tech than immediate profits. But that's part of the "run by geeks" appeal. Once it goes public and suits own the shares the initial drive pretty much dies.

Because corporations are SOOO oppressed in America, right?

Directed at #9: That'd be an Association of some sort.

edited 26th Mar '11 7:24:22 PM by GreatLich

Or a foundation.

Basically, a corporation can be for-profit or not-for-profit. You have to choose one or the other when you incorporate.

A for-profit corporation is legally required to try to make a profit, and to disburse that profit to its owners in some form (usually dividends on stock), whether it's privately held or publicly traded. A for-profit corporation that does things to avoid making a profit is very often regarded (and prosecuted) as fraudulent.

A not-for-profit corporation is allowed to make a profit, but is forbidden from disbursing that profit to its owners or shareholders, and is required instead to use it for the benefit of the corporation.

*puts on commie hat*

I am opposed corporate personhood for various reasons, though on a gut level I might say that it is because I find it to be a nauseating perversion of the concept of collective bargaining.

Corporate personhood is not unlimited in the US anyway. I think we can all agree it is at times beneficial to have a corporation be able to behave as if it were an individual — entering into contracts, for instance. There are ways it's not beneficial — corporations don't have the vote, for instance.

So really the question is not "corporate personhood, yes or no?" it's about when it's appropriate and when it's not.

It is never appropriate to grant a money-making scheme the status of 'person'. Ever.

It's not just about money-making schemes, though. Trade unions fall under the same definition. Environmental organizations. Charities. Any group founded for the purpose of having a louder voice collectively than a mass of individual people would have on their own.

Corporations do not have the status of persons. They are just allowed to do some things that persons are allowed to do.

The problem isn't so much corporate personhood, it's that generally criminal legal systems are ill-equipped to be dealing with corporations in general. How do you punish a corporation that violates the law? Give it a relatively small fine? Yeah. That will stop them. I personally think that for extreme cases, that shareholders need to be either wiped out or given a haircut in some fashion. Things such as massive fraud, or negligence resulting in death.

I also think that unilaterally editable contracts need to be made illegal, but that's a different story.

Unilaterally editable contracts should be illegal.

Agreeeing with Karmakin

A corporation cannot be "punished" for violating the law,

A corporation is immortal,

Plus, there's the whole agency problem (seriously, look it up, it explains so much of what is wrong with the world)

Actually you really could punish a corporation.

You could revoke it's charter.

You could fine it a substantial amount of money, as in maybe 100% of the average reported yearly profits over the last 5 years or so.

You could nationalize the company, zero out the shareholders send an investigation team inside it to find and prosecute criminals, clean up its practices and then put out a new initial IPO.

If it's fraud/mistreatment of workers you could turn the company into a worker/union owned company.

There's lots of options. Some are good, some are bad. But the options actually do exist.

(Did the mods disable the strike text for the forum too? It just deletes my text... huh...)

Nvm, that doesn't follow because then people who are unable to physically suffer pain wouldn't count as people. Was bad logic to begin with. Ahh well.

Should corporations be considered entities with a certain amount of rights, that are designed to protect the rights of the people that comprise said corporation? Oh, certainly. But that's not the same thing as being a person.

edited 28th Mar '11 11:41:24 AM by TheyCallMeTomu

Corps want to be treated like people? Fine. If a corp is responsible for another person's death and is found guilty, it should be executed. If it commits a crime, it should be put in jail. If it steals, it should make restitution and be punished.

Well gee Ralph, jail time for corporations doesn't make a whole lot of sense!

Then again, you could make the argument that Jail time for artificial intelligences without a single coherent body also doesn't make sense, so I don't know that I buy that argument...

If corporations were treated as people, they would pay income tax. So plainly, this is a euphemism for corporate socialism.