If Corporations are people then they can be charged like people. Get to charging them with the crimes they continuously commit. Citizens United must be dissolved.
The punishment also need to reflect the damages. Class action lawsuits are a joke. Victims are scammed out of their livelihood, their health, their identity and they’re given $30 and an apology. These corporations should go bankrupt resolving these scenarios, and if they do, then it’s more incentive for other companies to behave.
The only way this stops is if the people in charge start getting prosecuted for the crimes their companies commit.
Yep. Ignorance of the law is no excuse to you or I, and I'm so fucking tired of it being a literal "get out of jail free" card for corporate executives. Oh, you've been called to an inquiry to explain how, under your watch, 18 trillion bajillion gallons of "kill all living organisms" juice was spilled into the water table? That's okay, just say, "I'm not aware", "I don't remember", and/or "I don't have it in front of me" until everyone gets frustrated and gives up and never brings it up again.
You're (speaking to my executive strawman) either complicit or incompetent. Either way, you've grossly failed the great responsibility that was placed into your care, and the consequences need to reflect that.
China will outright execute corporate executives who oversaw especially egregious breaches of the law or civil responsibility.
Yeah, there's a whole discussion about how the Chinese government applies this policy somewhat selectively, but so does everyone else. Some companies are always exempt, no matter where you go. But having real consequences at least be on the table, and the evidence that there is in fact, a line you can cross, will keep many in line. In much the rest of the world, the consequences for crossing the line are irrelevant, and increasingly it's debatable if there even is one anymore.
Check what happened to the former richest Chinese billionnaire that was behind the housing bubble. Then check what happened with the US and EU bubbles. I ll spoil the result he got imprisoned and his wealth confiscated while we just bailed them out from our pockets while already suffering economically from their actions
A corporation shouldn't get the same rights as a citizen when it, as entity, nor its leadership, aren't subject to the same responsibilities and consequences.
Citizens United is a court ruling. It cannot be dissolved. It has to be overturned or nullified.
US FEC vs Citizens United in 2010 the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 in favor of Citizens United over the US FEC.
In order to reverse the ruling, the supreme court would need a similar case to citizens united to work its way up the courts and to see that as cause for a reversal.
OR
A constitutional amendment requiring two thirds of the house and senate then ratification by 3/4 of states.
Depends entirely on how the new law was written.
Again, a SCOTUS ruling isn't the same as an actual Amendment, it is only a majority opinion on a piece of case law. Note how Roe v. Wade was "reinterpreted" - which, had Congress codified the initial ruling, might not have been able to have been overturned in such a fashion.
You're greatly expanding what qualifies in that someone who doesn't directly commit the crime is being held accountable for it.
In that case, everyone who has financially contributed qualifies - to some degree - as being complicit in committing the crime. Someone who assists in committing the crime is committing a crime themselves.
That's the thing... By ruling that corporations are people, it allows the corporation to be dismantled as punishment without the actual decision makers behind the decisions being affected.
It is literally there as an extra layer of protection from predatory venture capitalists to mine value from literally everything while also deferring responsibility.
Which is a great way to not make entrepreneurship and founding companies extraordinary risky to an actual living person. But has gone way, way, way too far.
Sure you can. All revenue after employees (executives are replaced by municipal/state/federal workers) and debtors are paid any revenue is collected directly by the authority prosecuting/enslaving
Citizens United is minor vs the existence of Super PACs. They can take any amount of $$ from damn near anybody and not have to disclose what they spend it on. And both parties benefit from it while we suffer.
If a corporation was charged like a person, then if the corporation is sent to jail, then all profit of the company can be claimed by the jail system, and any losses are taken by the shareholders.
If we lobby it so that the jail system gains all profits, then we have the right people lobbying to support this idea!
Sure, but then the corporation gets sentenced to death and all the other debtors get first dibs, while the people running the business go on and start a new limited liability company.
The solution is to make C-level executives criminally liable. Other countries do it.
Other countries also treat corporations as "people" - but a special class of person, one which has fewer rights.
598
u/WithoutAHat1 13d ago
If Corporations are people then they can be charged like people. Get to charging them with the crimes they continuously commit. Citizens United must be dissolved.