Shareholders Care About More Than Just Profits

His Dicks Sporting Goods example actually cuts against his argument. When shareholders invested in Dicks, was the intent to secure a return on investment out to engage in anti-gun activism? And when Dicks stops selling guns, in the absence of legislation impacting all retailers / gun dealers, Dicks not selling guns simply drives that portion of their business to competitors like Academy Sports that continue to engage in the lawful sale of firearms. This results in no reduction in the number of guns, only cutting off and disenfranchising a subset of customers, not to mention the shareholders that don't agree with or wish to support anti-gun activism. Freidman's argument is more compelling.

nothing like a good laugh about dumb lies 😂

This guy is wrong... that's why Milton is Milton and he's...
If 51% of shareholders want to destroy the company like telling a gun shop to not sell guns and they were victim to a hostile take over in this guys dream world this is great.
In reality, in a free society, the company is providing a service and their goal should be to provide the best service.
If you don't like the service, create a company telling them not to, buy the entire company not just controlling shares, convince people, don't use money via the socialist lite system that we have to force your will on others.

ROI is usually an entity's #1 objective. If their customers increase/decrease revenue/ROI because of social advocate concerns (gun safety, environment) then the entity must address. And/or if shareholders have other #1 objectives or are social advocates, again the entity must address. However, Friedman's thinking was not incorrect---return on capital remains #1--but, an entity today has more influences to consider what impacts their ROI. To say he was wrong, shows a lack of intellectual bandwidth, especially for a "Harvard man".

A lot 😂. Free market capitalist religion has been exposed as bullshit.

MF was the typical full of himself clueless individual who reminds me so much of current CEOs...

Imo shareholders are the bane of companies I'm looking at you McDonald shareholders

Milton wasn't wrong on this one. Companies shouldn't be left to their own devices, especially large companies, when it comes to their impact on society and the environment. This is why we have government. Companies have proven time and again that they can't be trusted.

Friedman was right.What about the shareholders that do not want to do what you said. Of course do you use to left wing political issues to make your point. Simply does not pass the mustard. I asked the Thomas Sowell 3 questions. As opposed to what is question number one. You cannot get past that. Leftist elitist. No common sense.

Milton was right. Management needs to focus on the business and maximize profits and give those profits to the shareholders through dividends and they can do with it whatever they want. That way every shareholder gets what they want. The guy in the video is wrong. People invest to make money to save for retirement. We don’t care about any of this sideshow BS. Management works for us and their job is to maximize profits for us. And whoever made the decision on guns at Walmart and Dick’s should be fired. These are businesses, not the DNC. If you can’t put your own political views aside for the best interest of the company, then you don’t deserve to work in the business world.

This guy is spouting crap. If shareholders don't want guns then they don't invest in companies that make / sell them and polluting a lake is illegal so I'm not sure Friedman was promoting crime. Talk about ignoring facts to support your argument.

Milton Friedman was pro environmental regulation!

On the lake example Milton Friedman's argument would have been to impose some sort of pollution tax on businesses so they naturally would want to not pollute to save costs.

Whether to polute a lake in order to make a profit should not even be a question. Since some companies lack a moral compass and are willing to do almost anything to make profit, we need regulations imposed on businesses. Otherwise the society will pay the price in a different form, for the unjust activities done by corporations...
Also the sanctions for pollution should be much higher. Companies should not test the courts in a lawsuit leveraging that it is still profitable for them to cause damage and pay repercussions or even get away with it thanks to a good lawyer or lobist backing them up.
It's disgusting what people are capable of doing for a piece of shinny paper...

This is just mob rule applied to business. The mob is fickle and has no direction.

Absolute and utter rubbish .... total and utter misinterpretation of Milton.

My problem with CSR is that there is often a hidden element to it. And it's usually more than just branding or getting a better image in the eyes of the customers. Sometimes the organisations they use to carry out the CSR maybe involved with them and they could be doing some sort of money laundering for example..

Holy shit this guy hot mess. The fact that Nobel gave him a prize... is quite suspect.

😂 all the Milton Friedman stans trying to defend their God. Yeah, you idiots know more than the guy who won a damn Nobel prize. 😂 Some of these idiots think that their arguments are so strong too. As if Professor Hart just decided to debunk Friedman on a whim. This man is smarter than every single one of you tards.

Friedman was wrong. Deal with it.

He seems unprepared for this question, doesn't represent Friedman's argument very well here. Perhaps the paper is a better critique.

I’ve never heard such a load of twaddle. Friedman never encouraged corporations or anyone else to break the law. He did advocate for the basic sets of laws this twaddler is talking about. Argumentative and a non starter. This chap should re read his o level economics course books

Shareholder capitalism is a system where profit is king. Te upmost priority of businesses is to provide its investors and suppliers a certain amount money while still spending a good amount on its business and to charities. Concious capitalism is more about the value of the business the workers and the environment in my opinion than in shareholder capitalism but shareholder capitalism relies on a business that is of value in order to provide that mulla to its investors that in practice help evolve the business and maintain the business' value.

This guy is very wrong in his basic assumptions of how the free market operates. The free market is a market wherein if you do not support a company's actions in providing goods and services, you should therefore not invest and become a shareholder in that company. The man in his pollution example assumes that pro-environmental people would invest in a groundwater polluting company. In free market systems, you are free NOT to invest in these companies and therefore not get the dividend back as a result of company profit. Why would you invest in a company that pollutes when it goes against your values? You can see how he has used wrong examples and analogies.

people who care about social issues and can do something about it volunteer their time and money because they want to. some billionaires are literally scrooge.... these guys are definitely not the kind of people we would all prefer to be in positions of any kind of power... but then you have buffet, gates, carnegie, hell even the Koch bros, who do care prosocially about issues, and dont just want to trash the world they live in. Henry Ford.

Never heard someone twist up Friedman's words that bad. I have never heard him say we should pollute a lake and then clean it up.

What about workers even though dividends don’t decrease wages but with a buyback they decrease wages

It’s either he fried or not

just more hearless naive supply-side economics. Friedman was a psychopath.

All shareholders are of diff character though & some ppl only primarily care about money. I think its fine for a company to use the money it makes in whichever way it prefers & if pro-social expenditure isnt favorable for you, then you can go invest your lousy money somewhere else

And this guy wins a nobel price .... pure bullshit if a shareholder doesnt support what the company is doing he would pull out of the investment , that would be the right way

CSR is first and foremost marketing. It's all about the brand. This is pure ideology

Friedman would state that the externalized costs would be settled in a court of law. This is a perversion of Friedman.

If you know that there's a group in the country that is so ignorant it will boycott you for anything that seems right-wing it is in your own interest and also the shareholders interest to cut off any business that might cause you a boycott and hurt your business, goodwill and brand even more. The company isn't listening to the public because it cares about your opinion, it cares about keeping you as customer and making money. Why else do businesses mine so much data ?

Its merely a risk analysis. Everyone knows in business school you only take CSR into account because it's great pr, great marketing and an extra value which lead up to an increase in sales or consistent sales.

he extrapolated Freeman statement into something completely unrelated, this is the epic example of fake news

But what if the shareholders who want gun control are the vast minority?

Friedman DID NOT argue that a company should just pollute and then have someone else use dividend payments to clean up the mess. Friedman argued that pollution causes third party extrinsic costs, and the polluter should directly pay for or eliminate those costs. Total misrepresentation of Friedman's viewpoint.

That's not the Friedman argument applied to these cases. He misrepresented his position. Pathetic. Of course Milton Friedman would support polling the shareholders to see if they want to take a course of action such as not polluting the lake.

I think he's comparing apples to oranges. The debate over a corporation taking a position on a political issue is a whole different discussion than the debate about the efficiency of giving corporate funds to charity.

Entreprises are supposed to increase the economic pie. Making more money is hence a foremost.

His point of view is part of the philosophical values of the company and the type of shareholders it will attract. Saying that Milton Freeman is wrong is a clickbait.

The way I think of it, both the examples he made were completely inaccurate, both are examples have a question of basic morality, of making money despite harming others, charity is very different

If a decision makes sense from a business standpoint, then as a shareholder I am all for that.

But I am not supportive of CEOs and other executives using companies as their own outlet for their political beliefs (for either side). Buffett said it well, "I do not believe in imposing my political opinions on the activities of our businesses."

Friedman vs. stakeholder model.

Next time i will record my board meeting and share with you sir

The worst joke I've heard since Trump was elected as POTUS.

As shareholders there are a hoard of things to be considered + profit. Reputation is a big chunk of being successful.

First