, Columnist
Values, Activists and Oil
Also some macroeconomic advice from the parking garage manager.
Values and governance.
What is the purpose of a company? A popular answer is that corporations are supposed to maximize their financial returns to shareholders, that any deviation from that goal represents a failure of governance, and that managers, who are likely to want to deviate, need to be monitored and compensated to focus them on that goal. This is loosely called "good governance," and some people think of it as having moral value. But other people think the opposite: Shareholders are greedy and soulless and anonymous, there's nothing so great about them that you should want to make money for them, and often the way you make money for them is morally questionable.