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Comment by josh_fyi | Hacker News Reader

No company can thrive when putting politics over profit.

I don't think this dichotomy is a thing. But there are many examples of companies being active in societal issues and doing well. Eg http://www.tradeready.ca/2018/topics/supply-chain-management...

If the leadership adopts favored positions as part of their values, the company can still thrive financially, for example Chick-Fil-A and Ben and Jerry's But if they give in to multiple pressures, they will be distracted from the business side.

The largest growth Google had was under a pretty strict position. On the contrary, if you grow and mutate to a faceless corp, you begin to have problems attracting talent and in consequence innovate further. Wouldn't be the first time.

Don't think their asking them to take a stand against advertising. So, you could make an argument that they should be focusing on making their product more addictive and stop with the distractions.

Sounds like you don't believe in voting with your wallet.

If enough people protest against Blizzard that they make a public statement at their party (BlizzCon) about how they were wrong perhaps they're feeling the heat? If enough people cancel their services with Blizzard over this, they're feeling a direct result of their political decision on their profit.

Sure, a company can be pressured successfully. But if a company allows political pressures to distract it, it will not thrive.

Yea, but that's a significant chunk of your customers boycotting, not a noisy 1% of your work force throwing a fit

If blizzard knew the hit they would take to US sales for kowtowing to china would only be 1%, they wouldn't flinch

Those silly people, believing ethics are more important than pofit...

That just doesn't compute. If they literally were about ethics > profits or maximizing good, they wouldn't be putting their time into a massively for-profit operation. Collecting large checks and internal perks galore. They'd be more attracted to a non-profit.

Are there no ethical way to make a profit?

There are. This is certainly not to say that profits are automatically unethical or anything.

I just don't buy into the GP’s claim that they're putting ethics over profit.

Yes there are. Social enterprises do.

I believe your argument classifies as a "no true scotsman"[1].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_true_Scotsman

Contributing your (probably unskilled-at-what-you’re-doing ) labour directly at a non-profit is far less effective than working your skilled, high paying job and donating the money.

Yeah, that's probably true in a lot of cases.

I don't believe that profits are more important than ethics, just that it is impossible to satisfy various opinions on what ethics is, while maximizing profit

That's correct. And I don't believe maximizing your profit should always go before thinking about what you do is ethical.

When laborers make it hard for companies to make a profit by doing evil with the products of their labor, which is the goal of acts like this, it will make it hard to make a profit without political (ie ethical) mindfulness.

Certainly, that will make it hard to make a profit. A company can do well financially when they have political and (what they consider to be) ethical mindfulness, as Hobby Lobby or Ben and Jerry's, to take opposite examples.

What happens when employees from both other end of the spectrum simultaneously demand action?

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