>>>>>>Nope. I've never been a victim, but that doesn't change my belief that large companies are generally predatory, and do not necessarily have the best interests of their customers or their respective countries economies at heart. They pretty much care about one thing - their own greed, and if governments can't put a rein on that greed... well, nobody else can, and those who are not part of that greed continuum are fated for an uncomfortable future.
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>>But the point is that in the market system you act in your own best interests. This makes behavior predictable. An intelligent capitalist knows his first obligation is to his investors and employees. You are assuming sociopathic behavior is in the best interests of the company - I am claiming exactly the opposite.
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>Not necessarily. I'm not claiming anything at all about sociopathic behaviour other than in order to become the CEO in a major corporation, it helps to be sociopathic to some extent. And, I expect that usually it is not so much the best interest of the company that is the goal of that CEO, but more, power and money garnered to him/herself.

I always find it curious when people ascribe to others motives that are so much more base than their own <s> Isn't it just possible that CEOs are driven by the same things you are - they've just pointed their energies in another direction? Most of the petty tyrants I've met in business have been middle management and are reacting to a frustration with lack of success - and that has probably also been part of the reason.

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>>Look at public education. It didn't happen because social reformers thought it would be nice if people could read it happened because captalists perceived a literate workforce as being good for the bottom line. Political demagogues would have preferred illiterate mobs that could be manipulated by the elite.
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>I have to question that. If that were the case, then public education would only have grown up where such employees were needed. Public education in outlying areas where men were expected to go to work in the mines, in the forests, building railroads, etc should never have happened. But they did - even though kids growing up in those areas were never expected really to need to be able to read and write.

Public education was first argued by the likes of Mann and Barnard as good for society because it would produce good citizens and be a unifying and stabilizing factor for society. As immigrant populations increased it was seen as a way of integrating immigrants into the greater society (this, of course, was before the days of bilingual education <s> )

True that rural areas didn't place the same premium on the social need - and families placed demands the time of students in farm families. The was no compulsory elementary education on a national level until about the time of WWI - 70 years after it was implemented in NY.

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>>I think if those who were pushing the much needed healthcare reform in the US framed the argument in different terms they'd get more support where they need it. It is expensive and inefficient for out society to have anyone who does not have good health insurance and is one of those win-lose situations that is destabilizing. Good universal health care does not have to be argued strictly on theoretical or charitable grounds. It is good for everybody.
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>But it's not good for those making fortunes from private health care. Universal health care might well cause a lowering in the incomes of those running the private systems now. So argued on any other basis than moral, it's unlikely to gain much traction at all.
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>That's like saying that unemployment is bad for society. Yes on moral grounds, very much NO according to economic wizards.

I don't know what economic wizards you are talking about but unemployment is a sign of inefficient use of resources. If you sell goods, you need people to sell them to. Unemployed people are a negative on the society. I don't think "economic wizards" would tell you 20% unemployment is better for society that 4%.

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>>That was always a strong argument against institutional racism or sexism. Sure it's immoral, but it is also very bad for the economy and the society.
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>How can you possibly say that when you consider that the fortunes of so many were built on the backs of slave labour?

Rome was built on slave labor. It was one of the reasons economists will tell you Roman society suffered economically. It is not a good economic model. Moral arguments were used to support the idea of slavery and subjugation of women as often as to oppose it. But the most compelling argument was that losing productivity of a large portion of the population would put the society at a disadvantage - as WWI and WWII proved. Having large groups of the population who are not allowed to contribute to the full extent of their abilities is obviously not good for the society. That is not to say the moral argument is not compelling, just that it is not the whole story.

My point is that there are solid economic reasons for social justice and those arguments do not get made when they should be.

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>Do you honestly think that blacks and women won the right to vote because corporations thought it was good for the economy? Which economic gurus were preaching that? If it hadn't been for the fact that men were off fighting wars and there was, finally, no other choice, women would still be about 50 years behind where they are now.
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>>Same with predatory practices that are actually in restraint of trade. It is bad economics. Being a ruthless businessman is not the same thing as being a good businessman. There are a lot of factors involved in business success. When they are all in line the business actually makes more money with less hassle.
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>>Adam Smith actually got all that - a long time ago and with a much deeper understanding of the future than anything Marx cobbled together.
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>>>I don't recall who wrote it, but somebody said that in order to be the CEO of a major corporation, one needs to be relatively sociopathic. Within sane limits, I believe that, and I'm not convinced it's a good thing.
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>>I think to be a successful CEO you need exactly the opposite - you need to understand the long-term best interests of the corporations - and the larger the company and the further its reach the more that is intertwined with the health of the society.
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>>That is not to say people always behave that way, but you can't legislate them to do so - only educate them as to their own best interests.
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>>People vote with their dollars and voter turnout is high. And a lot of those voters are very offended by the self-proclaimed elite who claim they vote those dollars as they do only because they are stupid sheep who aren't sophisticated enough to understand what they want. I think there is too much emphasis on educating the unwashed masses not to shop at Walmart and not enough on educating the capitalists on the nature of intelligent capitalism.
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>And why do you suppose that is? Is it not because that's what makes more sense from a greed standpoint, which is the grease on which our society runs?

I'm really not sure if your point is that people (except you) are greedy and evil (except maybe also for elected officials who know best and can protect us - who are presumably less evil and/or greedy - from evil greedy people - who can be identfied by wealth or success or failure to feel guilty. This sounds like the deeply insightful "mean people suck" bumper sticker. While you may be describing certain aspects of human behavior I don't think you're describing the multiple roles we all play in society. Sounds more like a class argument and I think those hold up even less well in modern society than they did 150 years ago.