I had a great conversation with a high school friend of mine in the car on the New Jersey Turnpike the other day. She is a Democrat who is consulting for a well-known business school and is a female business owner herself. I am a Republican who is trying to build up a moderate voice. She asked why I am supporting Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney in the 2012 election when I voted for President Barack Obama in 2008. I said because Romney will run our country like a business.
That's when she went into a Milton Friedman-esque explanation of how businesses and government cannot be run the same way because their core goals are different. The bottom line for a business is delivering a profit, she said, not inaccurately.
In my opinion, too many voters today think of big business as the bogeyman in this economy. They could not have it more upside down. The perception is that business is doing well (I admit they are sitting on a lot of cash!) because of all the breaks they get from the Federal government. It's true businesses do get tax breaks. It's also true some corporations saw their profits soar in the last several years. The hope is that businesses will lead the recovery by using these breaks to create jobs. And I agree they should.
But, nothing illustrates the concept that "businesses are people" better than the fact that at the top of those businesses are real people making decisions about where to invest and when and whether to roll out new products or build a job creating factory, using the most human of instincts of all -- a gut feeling. And right now, those people don't feel confident enough about the guy in the White House to be doing any of those things.
I think it is really brilliant that Romney, in spite of what his advisors may be telling him, keeps saying, "Corporations are people." It's a way to humanize the "demon in the room." It's also a brilliant way to say, "Corporations are doing well because they're run by people like me. Just think what I can do for the economy as President."
This post is part of a weekly conversation with our Moms Matter 2012 political bloggers. To see the original question and what the other writers have to say, see Are Corporations People?
Image via Mitt Romney/Flickr
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Comments 10
The goal of a business is to provide the least amount of a product or service for the most amount of profit. Using that logic, Republicans would like to provide the people of America with the least amount of services (infrastructure, food and drug safety, emergency services, justice, etc.) for the most amount of taxes. Your friend was right. That's not how a government - a society - is operated.
I crack up when I hear "regulatory burden" or no confidence from American corporations and their conservative apologists. Why is it American companies can't handle their own country, but foreign companies can? According to OECD reports, the US attracted nearly $295 BILLION in FDI, way more than China and almost as much as the rest of the world because foreign businessmen have confidence and faith in the American business system. These foreign investments generated $670 BILLION in economic activity and supported over 5 million high-paying jobs. Foreign executives surveyed consistently stated that it is because of regulatory certainty & stability, lower taxes compared to anywhere else, and the value for money of American workers - indeed foreign corporations pay as much as 30% higher salaries compared to American corporations, so much for the gripe that unions make American workers too expensive. America in most international surveys ranks #1, by foreign businesses of course, as the best place to invest.
I'm not buying the lack of confidence excuse.
I am a cynic. Corporations can be good people, they just seldom choose to be. Being a good person means more than gettting the money. Being a good person is looking out for other people, as well. The only reason a corporation offers anything at all to employees is to get work out of them. The only reason a corporation offers anything to people outside the corporation is to get them to buy whatever that corporation is selling. Corporations are about the money, that is what they are designed to do, make a profit.
The country should not be run like a business, but they ECONOMY certainly can be. And it's the economy that we are struggling with the most at this moment.
You are talking out of your southern sphere. The country should NOT be run like a business. You might be naïve, all the way around. Sorry.
Love the article. The country should be run like a business, with respect given to an operating budget and the understanding that money doesn't grow on trees or in the pockets of millionaires. Romney understands that in order to be helpful to the American people, entitlement programs need to be both short-term and sustainable - what we have now are never-ending free rides that create dependence and acceptance of a government-provided lifestyle that is a burden on American workers. Romney 2012!