Selfishness, Exploitation, and the Profit Motive

2017 ◽  
pp. 115-127
Author(s):  
Antony Flew
Keyword(s):  
Author(s):  
Julian Velasco

This chapter examines fiduciary duty in corporate law. Fiduciary duty is pervasive as well as all encompassing in corporate law. One common misconception about fiduciary duty in corporate law is that it is merely aspirational. Fiduciary duties are not simply moral requirements, they are legal ones. They are not merely suggestions, they represent the demands of the law. Although corporate law has often compromised rather than insisting upon strict enforcement of fiduciary law principles, these compromises are due to practical considerations that are entirely consistent with the goals of fiduciary law. In corporate law, general fiduciary law principles are balanced with practical considerations concerning the profit motive in order to achieve the best overall result for the shareholders. Understanding this tension between ambition and practicality is key to understanding fiduciary duty in corporate law. This chapter first considers the triggers for fiduciary duty in corporate law before discussing the role that the duty of loyalty plays in corporate law. It then explores the duty of care in corporate law, along with other fiduciary duties such as good faith, takeover situations and contests for control, shareholder voting rights, and the duty to monitor and the duty to disclose. The chapter proceeds by analyzing mandatory and default rules regarding the extent to which fiduciary duties can be waived in corporate law and concludes with an overview of remedies for breach of fiduciary duty.


Philosophia ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marja K. Svanberg ◽  
Carl F. C. Svanberg

AbstractThis paper will show that if we take conventional ethics seriously, then there is no moral justification for business profits. To show this, we explore three conventional ethical theories, namely Christian ethics, Kantian ethics and Utilitarian ethics. Since they essentially reject self-interest, they also reject the essence of business: the profit motive. To illustrate the relationship, we will concretize how the anti-egoist perspective expresses itself in business and business ethics. In business, we look at what many businesses regard as proof of their virtue. In business ethics, we look at what many business ethicists say about the relationship between morality and self-interest and, thus, the profit motive. Ultimately, we will argue that conventional ethics can, at most, only justify the means of business (i.e., aspects of running a business), but not the end of business (i.e., profits).


Social Forces ◽  
1993 ◽  
Vol 72 (1) ◽  
pp. 290
Author(s):  
Robert Zussman ◽  
Bradford H. Gray
Keyword(s):  

Science News ◽  
1995 ◽  
Vol 148 (3) ◽  
pp. 35
Author(s):  
Hal Hellman
Keyword(s):  

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 612-648
Author(s):  
Johannes Scherling

Abstract For a few decades now and most prominently promoted by the US, neoliberal economics have been on the rise, epitomized in recent austerity policies with regard to countries that have met financial trouble. In particular the drive for privatization of core public services relating to basic human needs, such as water, social services or pensions, has been increasingly criticized because of a perceived incompatibility between the profit motive and social solidarity. This article uses a corpus-based analysis of the discourse on privatization in the US of proponents supporting, respectively opposing it, with an overall corpus size of about 230,000 tokens. It examines how the two groups conceptualize privatization differently and which strategies are applied to fore- or background particular aspects of it.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephanie Monteiro Miller

Purpose In a wide variety of settings, individuals target round-numbered thresholds, relaxing effort when they are out of reach. This paper aims to investigate whether this phenomenon occurs in nonprofits as well. Design/methodology/approach The paper empirically examines nonprofits’ propensity to cut expenses relative to the attainability of the zero-profit threshold. Findings This paper finds nonprofit firms are more likely to cut expenses when faced with small expected losses than with larger losses, and this pattern varies predictably with incentives to reach the zero-profit threshold. Research limitations/implications This suggests managers are motivated by desire to reach the zero-profit threshold rather than to improve firms’ economic situations, as the propensity to cut expenses is lower when the threshold is out of reach. Social implications Additionally, the results suggest that even the lack of explicit profit motive may not quell earnings management behavior. Originality/value These results begin to close the gap in our understanding of expense management in nonprofit firms, showing how operating expenses can be used to manage earnings.


Spine ◽  
2004 ◽  
Vol 29 (22) ◽  
pp. 2588-2591 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bradley K. Weiner ◽  
Benjamin H. Levi
Keyword(s):  

1975 ◽  
Vol 13 (9) ◽  
pp. 516-517
Author(s):  
Lawrence Corrado
Keyword(s):  

2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 18-26
Author(s):  
Gyanendra Bikram Shah

The nonprofit and public sectors are facing significant numbers of impending retirements from the traditionalists and baby boomers in their workforces. In an effort to retain the knowledge base of an agency or to better serve its clients, some organizations have developed creative ways to encourage retirement-eligible employees to remain on the job. Public and nonprofit organizations are driven by the knowledge and skills their employees possess. It is shortsighted for elected officials, board members, funders, executives, and other agency leaders to dismiss the importance of SHRM. As important, organizations must reinforce the importance of human capital and the contribution that knowledge management makes to the effective delivery of services.  


Author(s):  
Aminu Ahmadu Hamidu ◽  
Md. Harashid Haron ◽  
Azlan Amran

Economic dimension of corporate social responsibility (CSR) represent the main aim of establishing all forms of business organizations. The outcome from all transactions translate into the process of attaining continuity, growth, satisfactory returns, maximization of shareholders wealth and provision of goods and services to the community. Achievement of all these goals depends on how managers are able to perfect the profit motive objective and satisfy the needs of all stakeholders. A total of 164 respondents who are the managers responsible for decision making on all corporate social responsibility activities were engaged in answering the questionnaire for this study. The managers were representing different sub sectors of the Nigerian financial sector. A statistical analysis on the data was done by using the partial least square approach (PLS-SEM). Results from the analysis revealed that both profit motive and stakeholder needs are positively related with the economic dimension of CSR. Religiosity of managers is also positively related with ability of managers to attain economic responsibilities they were employed to achieve. With the role of religiosity as a significant moderating factor managers are expected to align CSR activities with accepted religious values that instills hard work, trust and assistance to stakeholders to fulfill the overall economic dimension of corporate social responsibility.


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