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Corporate Ethics

Minoosh

Penultimate Amazing
Minoosh
Joined
Jul 15, 2011
Messages
12,761
Segnosaur said:
Another lawsuit that the government will have to deal with:

From: https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/09/tech/amazon-pentagon-trump-bezos/index.html
Amazon alleged on Monday that President Donald Trump abused his position to apply "improper pressure" on Pentagon decision-makers to stop the company from winning a military contract worth billions of dollars. In a formal protest unsealed at the US Court of Federal Claims, Amazon (AMZN) said Trump "launched repeated public and behind-the-scenes attacks" against the company in an effort to undermine its bid and hurt CEO Jeff Bezos, "his perceived political enemy" because of his ownership of The Washington Post.
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At this I point I dislike Bezos almost as much as I do Trump.
 
Minoosh said:
At this I point I dislike Bezos almost as much as I do Trump.
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There are things I like about Bezos and things I hate. He's a mega-billionaire with an ego to match. He's a very shrewd businessman and takes no prisoners. But unlike Trump Bezos does have principles.

Everyone assumed Amazon was going to win the cloud contract. Their product is better than Microsoft's. Bezos is probably right that the reason Amazon lost this contract was because Trump put his thumb on the scale. But proving it is probably difficult. I expected Amazon to challenge this.
 
acbytesla said:
There are things I like about Bezos and things I hate. He's a mega-billionaire with an ego to match. He's a very shrewd businessman and takes no prisoners. But unlike Trump Bezos does have principles.

Everyone assumed Amazon was going to win the cloud contract. Their product is better than Microsoft's. Bezos is probably right that the reason Amazon lost this contract was because Trump put his thumb on the scale. But proving it is probably difficult. I expected Amazon to challenge this.
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Any contract this big is going to get challenged. But if Amazon files within existing contracting procedures, the government would have to appoint a judge-like (master?) individual to hear both sides and make a ruling. There are certain procedures in place for things like this, but anyone can sue anyone at anytime. My experience? 6 months delay per billion.
 
acbytesla said:
There are things I like about Bezos and things I hate. He's a mega-billionaire with an ego to match. He's a very shrewd businessman and takes no prisoners. But unlike Trump Bezos does have principles.

Everyone assumed Amazon was going to win the cloud contract. Their product is better than Microsoft's. Bezos is probably right that the reason Amazon lost this contract was because Trump put his thumb on the scale. But proving it is probably difficult. I expected Amazon to challenge this.
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I prefer my billionaires to be actual billionaires.
 
acbytesla said:
There are things I like about Bezos and things I hate. He's a mega-billionaire with an ego to match. He's a very shrewd businessman and takes no prisoners. But unlike Trump Bezos does have principles.

Everyone assumed Amazon was going to win the cloud contract. Their product is better than Microsoft's. Bezos is probably right that the reason Amazon lost this contract was because Trump put his thumb on the scale. But proving it is probably difficult. I expected Amazon to challenge this.
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If Bill Gates still ran Microsoft, Trump would really be in trouble since Gates has said a lot of unkind things about Donnie.
 
Minoosh said:
Another lawsuit that the government will have to deal with:

From: https://www.cnn.com/
Amazon alleged on Monday that President Donald Trump abused his position to apply "improper pressure" on Pentagon decision-makers to stop the company from winning a military contract worth billions of dollars.
Click to expand...
At this I point I dislike Bezos almost as much as I do Trump.
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Just out of curiosity, what exactly is the reason for your dislike of Bezos?

Is it because of this particular court action (challenging the pentagon over the awarding of a contract to Microsoft rather than Amazon)? Well, given the size of the contract, as well as the personal attacks by Trump, I think his response is understandable (even if the chance of winning in court is slim).

Is it because of his other actions?

Yes, he can be rather ruthless as a businessman. (For example there have been issues, like possibly demanding too much to build a secondary headquarters.) But he has nowhere near the reputation of Donald "screw contractors via lawsuits and declare bankruptcy" Trump.

And he isn't quite as generous as, for example Bill Gates, But he has donated considerably to charity (with his own money too! Unlike Trump, who's charity foundation had to be closed because of illegal activity). Causes like same sex marriage, press freedom, education for undocumented immigrants, combatting global warming, and Veterans affairs.

And consider some of his other side businesses... space exploration, the Washington Post, both of which are (in my opinion) very worthwhile ventures for society in general. Compare that to Trump: outside of real estate and bankrupt casinos, he has invested in an airline, vodka, steaks, a magazine, a 'university', and mortgage financing, all of which either went out of business (at best) or were complete scams (at worst).

I'm not saying Bezos should be seen as some sort of saintly figure who should be winning the Nobel peace prize. But I just think that even with his flaws, he should not be compared in any way with Trump, who belongs in a whole special class of scum.
 
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Segnosaur said:
Just out of curiosity, what exactly is the reason for your dislike of Bezos?

Is it because of this particular court action (challenging the pentagon over the awarding of a contract to Microsoft rather than Amazon)? Well, given the size of the contract, as well as the personal attacks by Trump, I think his response is understandable (even if the chance of winning in court is slim).

Is it because of his other actions?

Yes, he can be rather ruthless as a businessman. (For example there have been issues, like possibly demanding too much to build a secondary headquarters.) But he has nowhere near the reputation of Donald "screw contractors via lawsuits and declare bankruptcy" Trump.
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There are numerous reasons, but many of them were reinforced by a very recent "New Yorker" article. I'm on a tablet and have had no luck with copying and pasting links. One of these days I'll figure it out. If you're curious, you can probably find it pretty easily online.
But here are a few things:

- Guys who send dick pics do kind of bug me.
- He wouldn't sign the giving pledge.
- IMO, he treats his warehouse staff poorly.
- He is in some ways a libertarian ideologue.

I hadn't known his net worth was $114 *billion*, which affected my view of the last 3 items. He could afford to pay workers more and improve working conditions. Ideologically, he may be on firm enough ground, but emotionally, it turned me off.

I accidentally posted before I was finished, but this is a reasonable start.
 
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Minoosh said:
I hadn't known his net worth was $114 *billion*, which affected my view of the last 3 items. He could afford to pay workers more and improve working conditions.
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Devil’s Advocate here, but as head of a publicly traded company, he has a fiduciary responsibility to maximize profits. I think he would have to make the case that higher pay would have long term positive effects on Amazon’s profitability. He - and his board - would need to link any raise to something more concrete than “fairness” or “charity”.

Disclaimer: I own some Amazon stock, am an Amazon Prime member and order things through them on a regular basis.
 
a_unique_person said:
Amazon has a moral obligation to treat it's employees humanely. Bezos as a human being has moral obligations to his employees.
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Perhaps, but if that runs counter to the fiduciary duty, he could find himself fired, sued and even banned from being a director.

Companies are not run for the benefit of their customers or their employees, they are run solely for the benefit of their shareholders.
 
The Don said:
Companies are not run for the benefit of their customers or their employees, they are run solely for the benefit of their shareholders.
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Shareholder theory is a terrible thing and we would likely not suffer at all from it being removed from practice entirely.

ETA: Rather, as a whole, we would fairly certainly benefit from larger companies having less impetus to maximize profits by interfering with government rather than making productive investments and more jobs, as one simple example.
 
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Minoosh said:
I accidentally posted before I was finished, but this is a reasonable start.
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And now I'll address things that aren't strictly his fault.

I compare his actions to Wal-Mart. Many people thought it was just great being able to buy lots of cheap Chinese manufactured goods. (Though Wal-mart tried to brag about "Made in the USA," they got in trouble for this. ) Then some time later noticing that American manufacturing was hurting, and that big-box stores were crowding out local businesses. I felt that some of their practices were anti-competitive and socially irresponsible. Now, not everyone agrees that businesses have any duty to communities; that their highest moral calling to maximize value for shareholders. The Walton family holds the majority of Wal-Mart stock, Bezos does not command that share of Amazon, so my criticism for him is more muted.

But: it's going to function like a monopoly as much as it possibly can. It is going to integrate vertically. It will operate at a loss to consolidate market share. I'm typing this on an Amazon tablet: I buy a fair number of ebooks from them and pay no separate sales tax. So, I'm hurting locally owned bricks and mortar bookstores solely for convenience. My fault, not Amazon's. Maybe Amazon has some kind of deal with states to reimburse for some taxes; I'm not up for researching that right now. But if not, I'm hurting local people. Schools. Retail staffers. Road repairs. Etc.

And finally, I have some distaste for the trend of having everything delivered to your home. I'd be curious if that affects our carbon footprint.

And a thing I just remembered: The promise of immediate delivery was creating possible safety problems in the fullfilment/delivery chain. And a lot of stress.

This is kind of off off-topic in this thread and I'll admit, not rigorously researched. So I'm sure I've left myself open to justifiable criticism. This could be its own thread.
 
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thaiboxerken said:
Which is wrong. This rampant capitalism needs to stop.
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Aridas said:
Shareholder theory is a terrible thing and we would likely not suffer at all from it being removed from practice entirely. Rather, as a whole, we would fairly certainly benefit from larger companies having less impetus to maximize profits by interfering with government rather than making productive investments, as one simple example.
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thaiboxerken said:
I agree. Businesses should be run to benefit stakeholders and society.
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Interesting sentiments, but right now a company director could, at worst, find themselves jailed for failing to put shareholders' interest first.
 
Minoosh said:
And finally, I have some distaste for the trend of having everything delivered to your home. I'd be curious if that affects our carbon footprint.
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Seems to make sense to me to have a single vehicle make a trip to deliver to multiple customers from a central distribution facility than to have those customers drive all over the place to pick up items individually.

Same goes for home delivery on grocery shopping, better for one van to deliver to 20 customers than 20 customers drive to the shop.
 
Fast Eddie B said:
At first glance, it sure seems like one truck making 50 deliveries would be more “green” than 50 consumers each making trips to the store.
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Maybe in suburban/rural areas. In dense urban areas, the math starts to change. More people walk to stores, and if they do drive, they are driving a short distance, and delivery trucks tend to increase traffic as they block roads for longer while making deliveries.
 
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