It is a newspaper article and does not contain the entire story.  Unlike you, I actually know someone involved and the facts behind the situation.  Feel free to accept all facts from the “corporate” newspaper.  

No, 401k’s are not ironclad, but anyone knows that a 401k invested in one company is much riskier than one diversified over numerous corporations.  

Also, I don’t recall ever saying I was a Romney man.  I am ABSOLUTELY not.  In this political atmosphere you couldn’t pay me to vote for any of the possible winners, R or D.  I just pointed out Romney has been ridiculed by taking a quote out of context.  Corporations are groups of multiple persons.  The word for multiple persons is “people”.  He wast just trying to say that when you tax a corporation, you are not taxing an inanimate object.  Those taxes end up being paid by the the people who own the corporation, and also passed on to their customers.  

Read the article, management, from the top down (CEO) proposed the ESOP and brought the employees in. They risked their retirement because they had faith in their company and especially in their management and each other. The entities that owned the majority of voting shares, non participating foreign owners, were accepting offers, for reasons purely their own. 

You have to be thick to think that a 401k is some sort of ironclad guarantee, have you been asleep these past 25 years? And the average worker had 16 years, a 401k with 16 years is not sufficient to retire beyond poverty. If they were bought out and liquidated, a Bain specialty, they would have no job, no prospects and minimal savings. 

It is hilarious that you posted that without reading it, you are truly a Romney man, you are precisely the sort of American he wants to “lead”.

Do you even see what the title implies? “It’s a gamble on paper” Christ Greg, it’s a paper company, the title is a pun, the real risk was in not doing what they did.

corporate personhood (in the strict sense of limiting liability) is not a problem per se.

Which is exactly what I meant.  I think that is pretty specific.  Especially the parenthetical.  “Also some downsides” is in no way a flip-flop unless you assume that unless I qualify something I think it’s perfect.  I don’t know why you would assume that.

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFA50FBC214A6CE87

http://d24w6bsrhbeh9d.cloudfront.net/photo/5416116_460s_v3.jpg

Corporate personhood is part of the problem.  Your initial comment denied this, but now you admit it:

I would also argue the the limitations of liability provided by corporations do have some merit.  But also some downsides.

Please excuse me for responding to what you said rather than what you meant.

As such, I think you owe Al an apology…..

Leads to the idea that we have enshrined the sociopathic personality as some sort of acceptable standard for human/person behavior.

—————————————————–

?? Your example fails. The employees were happy with management, a management that sold/encouraged the ESOP plan to purchase. A management that was retained and included in the ESOP. The company was on the road to new ownership already as it was on the auction block seeking to be acquired. 

The company already possessed the structure of a cooperative operationally, for 20 years+, which puts them further from the norm, and enjoyed a mutually beneficial relationship between unions/labour and management. 

Your example is so far from the norm as to be called extreme exception, proving the rule.

Also, the company was valued and sold at 810 million, and does 1 billion in revenue, which may indicate an annual retained earning of 200 million +, which is good, although still small compared to large corporations it has had good returns for years.

Sorry, but your brother didn’t buy out management, was not unhappy with management, and the risk is no greater than the prospect of job loss, damaged pensions/lost retirement that can easily and has before resulted if the new and unknown owner had turned out to be associated with your buddies at Bain Capital.

GJ on proving everybody else correct Greg.

bon appetit!

Did you see the Op-Ed piece the other day which essentially said we should get rid of the US Constitution cause it just gets in the way of governing, and put for the proposition that protections for the individual against government deprivation of property or liberty are still good ideas but they should just be done out of basic respect and don’t need to be enshrined in a constitution?  

That is true, as far as it goes.  But the original idea was that the liability was faced in accomplishing a purpose necessary to the public good.  Also originally, in addition to having to demonstrate a public benefit, the charter of a corporation was not perpetual, as it is today, but was limited in duration to the time necessary to actually achieve the objective.

The argument is against them having their own “free $peech” rights, separate and apart from the individuals who constitute them.

All the points you make for having them are valid.  What’s missing is any notion that there should be some quid pro quo to society at large for the privilege of this protection which is not afforded to individuals.

That’s the nut of the matter, in my opinion.  Every right bestowed by the state has a corresponding duty to the state.  As currently constituted, (although a deviation from the original concept which required a valid public purpose), a corporation has NO higher legal obligation than the “best interests of the shareholders”.

If you believe those to be the same as the best interests of society at large then there’s not problem.  I don’t.

Someone actually did make the fetus argument.  And predictably..it failed.

http://www.snopes.com/autos/law/carpool.asp

Though it was not even the actual issue before the Supreme Court, that having been the applicability of McCain Feingold to a pay-per-view as opposed to other broadcast media, Justice John Roberts actually called for rehearing after the main argument on the issue of whether or not a corporation had the same “free speech” rights as an individual.

Draw what inferences you will from the fact that rehearings, while not uncommon, are usually to clarify some point prior argument before the court, and it was rather exceptional to call for one on an issue not even raised but injected by the justice.

In the context of McCain Feingold the term “free speech” applies to limits on the amounts of money they can contribute and/or spend promoting political purposes.

Prior to C.U. there were limits on corporate vs. individual contributions.  The decision removed those limits by equating them as the same.

A similar issue on the other side of the political spectrum is raised by the contributions of unions, using the dues of members to promote political causes and candidates.  In those cases, the courts recognize the rights of individuals to opt out of that portion of their dues which goes to support political issues.

So why are not shareholders permitted the same discretion?  Perhaps it hinges on some notion of ownership vs. membership.  I don’t know.  I only know the distinction exists.

You may be right, but I think there is ample precedent for people with causes to file lawsuits knowing they will fail, but only for the purpose of illustrating the ridiculousness, (in their opinion), of the underlying proposition, (in this case personhood bestowed upon corporations), in what they consider to be a logical, if somewhat tenuous extension of the idea.

The purpose in these instances is not to win, per se, but to encourage public discussion of the idea and popularize debate about it, or in the least, draw attention to it.

If you mean no one would file a lawsuit if it was that frivolous, you underestimate the willingness of the public to spend a couple hundred bucks to prove a point.  The article doesn’t say where this was filed, but if I had to guess I’d bet it was California. 

The reason I said “clearly” is because the court looks, when necessary, to the intent of legislation in interpreting the applicability of a law to a particular set of circumstances.  This set of circumstances is one that applies only in the semantic sense and utterly fails the legal test required to be applied by a court.

That said..I guess anything is possible.  But not all things are probable.  So, I will concede that it’s clear perhaps only to me that it will fail, and likely on those grounds. 

It may not be clear to you, but that, in itself, is not really suasive.  If you can present me with a legal theory which might indicate some possible success for the proposition, I’d be happy to be less clearly convinced.

PS – The clearest examples of filing a lawsuit based on an argument you know will fail, are those filed by public interest groups who wish to challenge a law. Often those must be filed in a case with local jurisdiction in order to appeal them to higher courts, possibly with the intent of taking them to State or Federal Supreme Courts to get a hearing and modification of a particular provision or a decision overturning the entire law on constitutional grounds. In this case, I doubt that’s the motive since those groups tend to shop for fact sets that might have some greater degree of success of being heard by a higher court.

Risks are easier to take when you know failure or a medical bill won’t ruin your life financially.

That risk is one of the things that I think the limited liability of incorporation is intended to mitigate.  Another way to mitigate it is to have a MUCH more socialized society.  But that probably means higher taxes.

And even so – the US is a VERY litigious society.  As an entrepreneur I would be leery of starting a business without the legal protection of a corporation.  Not because I want to plunder society.  But because people sue at the drop of a hat in this country.  Sad but true.

I would also argue the the limitations of liability provided by corporations do have some merit.  But also some downsides.

And if we want to do away with corporations – what’s the alternative?  Co-operatives are an interesting idea.

I’m just saying – instead of all the general hand-wringing – let’s talk specifics.

Did you understand it?

If it was clear, they wouldn’t bother with all this bother.

But the notion that’s being greeted with incredulity and contempt here is that the first amendment protects corporate speech *at all*.

No, the notion that’s being greeted with incredulity and contempt here is the fact that the first amendment has been interpreted as guaranteeing a corporation — a legal person but one with no mind and therefore no political opinions — to spend unlimited money on political advertising.

In other words, corporations allow the human beings who control their assets to use money that is not their own to push their own political agendas into the media.  The effect of this is to amplify the political speech of those individual human beings who control large corporations.  The corporation itself — again, no mind, no opinion.

The problem is that this seems to stack the deck maybe a little too far in favor of capital.  I think the concern is understandable.

I haven’t seen anyone express any problems with protection of corporate speech outside of politics.

I see your attitude everywhere, especially from libertarians.  It seems to boil down to this:
-Unless every single politician, legislator, and political appointee is doing his or her job flawlessly and without any immoral or unethical dealings, the problem is the fault of the government.
-Even if corporations/owners or operators thereof are doing incredibly unethical, terrible, horrible things or ruining the economy through their incompetence, the problem is the fault of the government.

I don’t buy it.  It doesn’t make any sense.  There IS an onus on people working for and within corporations to do so ethically and if corporate personhood lets such people avoid this responsibility then we really should be reconsidering that legal doctrine.  You can’t tell me it’s the government’s fault when Wells Fargo launders money for Los Zetas.  Someone at Wells Fargo should bear a little responsibility too.