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PBS NewsHour: CEOs are saying they need to be more socially minded. Will anything change?
Published on Aug 20, 2019
For decades, the driving goal for corporate America has been maximizing stockholders' profits. So what made nearly 200 of the country's most prominent companies issue a joint statement this week, representing a major philosophical shift? John Yang talks to Steven Pearlstein of The Washington Post and author of "Can American Capitalism Survive?"
John Yang: You say this move has — this shift has been going on for a while. So why now? Why make this formal declaration now?
Steven Pearlstein: Well, several, but one of which is the political environment, where, you know, you have the two leading — or two of the three leading Democratic presidential candidates going around saying the big problem is corporate greed.
And they probably overstate the case and are pretty harsh about their populist complaint. But, you know, that's added to fact that for years businesses and business leaders have been held in lower and lower regard by the public.
John Yang: You mentioned the political environment. The two Democratic candidates — the Democrats may take Congress back. Why shouldn't we just see this as a P.R. gimmick, as trying to get out ahead of an issue, of trying to trying to look good?
Steven Pearlstein: Well, to me, that's progress. When the corporate community tries to get out ahead of something like that and acknowledges that they may have overdone things, and then that's a win.
I mean, I don't know how that — yes, it is good for P.R., but if they don't follow through, if we continue to see companies that say, I'm giving up my American citizenship so that we don't have to pay U.S. taxes anymore because our shareholders are making us do it, if companies say, we're going to crush our unions because our shareholders are making us do it, they won't be able to get away with that anymore.
Read the Full Transcript
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/ceos-are-saying-they-need-to-be-more-socially-minded-will-anything-change