Reasons to be wary of some businesses

Before the one-sided bias of this post takes hold, be aware the fact of the matter is businesses can be good and bad. Businesses provide goods and services to the public, generate jobs and play a major role in economic stability. In turn, the people of the world, consume, innovate and develop in ways that materially speaking are unmatched by any other form of civilization in known human history. In this sense, businesses can be trusted to benefit society by providing for its material needs via commercial economics. There is also no doubt businesses do good via charitable contributions, but what if those donations were not tax deductible?

As long as businesses are primarily profit driven engines, then technically, and many times in actuality, anything under the law is allowable. For example, the food supply contains semi-addictive sugar, mono-sodium glutamate and according to The Great Plains Laboratory, Inc., opiate like gluten products.  All these ingredients stimulate appetite.  Apparently however, this laboratory business does not make its money from the food supply. Such being the case, it may be more at risk of providing doctors with lots and lots of things to diagnose making a perfect circle of profitability where consumers eat more, and get sick, then have to pay for it.

There is also the issue of public perception. Moreover, according to the widely referred to economic and social research firm Gallup, public sentiment is quite unimpressed by business practices. Specifically 66 percent of people worldwide think businesses are corrupt according to a public opinion poll. Gallup is a business though, perhaps they are corrupt in how they disclose statistics then. In other words, maybe the research is aimed at informing businesses about how customers can be better lied to using statistical polling data rather than what business practices should be changed for the sake of mankind.

Businesses also exploit the labor force by hiring temps and part-time workers below 35 hour per week shifts; this helps lower benefit costs while providing the same quality of service. On a more high-brow level, misplaced confidence in financial models is exploited to serve the ends of business and not clients per James Montier in a GMO White Paper called "The Flaws of Finance." Moreover, financial practitioners need a Hippocratic Oath because their intentions are so skewed per Montier.

The theme of Montier is expressed differently by the late comedian George Carlin who provided an artistic take on businesses. Specifically, in his stand up work he referred to them as untrustworthy because they lie and pretend to be servicing when instead they are really doing something more sinister. Carlin is referring to the shadow side of business that often gets swept under the rug. This shadow side is not too far away from what Montier is talking about when he refers to the misuse of financial models, some of which led the world into a financial crisis.

George Carlin on the American Dream

Warning: Rated R; contains profanity.

It's important to reiterate, not all businesses are as bad or as dysfunctional as either Carlin or Montier portray them, but all businesses are capable of quite a lot. Many businesses prefer the honest dealings of ethical business and earn their clients' and customers' patronage that way. Furthermore, it is quite possibly the case the majority of small-businesses are quite reasonable with their views of the limitations of financial modeling. Just look at corporate social responsibility. That fact the concept exists is a good thing, but according to The Economist, how it is used is a completely different story. Referring to the well known economist Robert Reich, The Economist discusses CSR as a tool of manipulation more than a genuine attempt at responsibility. Hmmm.