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A corporation is the instrument of its shareholders. The shareholders are the ones pursuing unlimited profits. Joel Bakan's argument makes it seem like humans -- people -- who own the corporation are blameless.

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According to WSJ* index funds currently hold about 5% of the US stock market, and it seems likely that share will grow. How in the hell do you hold shareholders accountable under a system like that? This seems like a big problem already, and only likely to get worse as direct ownership gets more and more convoluted and obscured by various investment systems. I don't have any suggestions for a fix unfortunately :(

*https://www.wsj.com/articles/index-funds-are-the-new-kings-o...

Alternatively people just want to be very fucking good at their job and there is an exec or a contract lawyer doing this as a way of being better than other execs or contract lawyers at the company. Add to that the fact that the main purpose of any large organization (and organism) is to survive and perpetuate itself and you get this. The shareholders and heck even the CEO don't need to be in on this or even care.

It's attempting to shift blame around in exactly the same way as shifting half a contract. The profits but not the consequences.

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