At the individual level I agree that people are not 100% good or 100% evil. Corporations may have good people that work there and help with tasks that are mostly evil. But companies that are truly evil and offer no product, no benefit, no public good, no service, do not exist. A truly evil company offers nothing and expects everything in return. So from my perspective it's impossible for a company to be 100% evil. But some larger companies will get as close as they can.
Any for profit company that is sufficiently large enough will eventually behave in ways that are evil.
The problem here is corporate bylaws and shareholders. Many Corporate bylaws state the only purpose of the company is to pursue profits, everything else is secondary.
These things create a perverse incentive to continuously show growth.
It's not enough to be profitable as a company. The company is expected to continuously expand their market share.
If they own a relatively small market share they can innovate, improve their product, get better at marketing or sales and expand their share that way.
But eventually if they are already the dominant player in a market, to continue to grow they must snuff out competition with anti-competitive behavior and expand into to new markets often by buying companies already in those markets. And If a C level executive or board member refuses to put profits over people, they can be ousted by shareholders or sued for securities fraud.
This behavior pattern of infinite expansion of market share is the symptom created by the perverse incentives of shareholders and will eventually drive any for profit company that is large enough and has shareholders to behave in ways that we consider evil.
And while I am sure the solution is likely reclassification into B Corporations or non-profits, getting companies to reclassify is not going to be easy.
Any for profit company that is sufficiently large enough will eventually behave in ways that are evil.
The problem here is corporate bylaws and shareholders. Many Corporate bylaws state the only purpose of the company is to pursue profits, everything else is secondary.
These things create a perverse incentive to continuously show growth.
It's not enough to be profitable as a company. The company is expected to continuously expand their market share.
If they own a relatively small market share they can innovate, improve their product, get better at marketing or sales and expand their share that way.
But eventually if they are already the dominant player in a market, to continue to grow they must snuff out competition with anti-competitive behavior and expand into to new markets often by buying companies already in those markets. And If a C level executive or board member refuses to put profits over people, they can be ousted by shareholders or sued for securities fraud.
This behavior pattern of infinite expansion of market share is the symptom created by the perverse incentives of shareholders and will eventually drive any for profit company that is large enough and has shareholders to behave in ways that we consider evil.
And while I am sure the solution is likely reclassification into B Corporations or non-profits, getting companies to reclassify is not going to be easy.