Banks, shareholders and stakeholders
“I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around the banks will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.” — Thomas Jefferson, 1802
I personally think that the total deregulation of the banking system was a huge mistake in Australia. I think there are certain infrastructural elements in every country (eg. Transportation, telecommunications, education, banking, etc.) that should never be privatised (at least not fully), but I guess we’ll have to wait for the current experiment of selling everything off to fail before we come back to a more sane position. The big focus on maximising outcomes for “shareholders” seems to be a very limited way of looking at institutional success, particularly when most shareholders actually care very little for the company in question, only its relative share price. At some point, I hope, stakeholders beyond shareholders will become more important, but I guess this is unlikely in the short term, where most executive leadership is rewarded based on share price with bonuses often in the form of shares – any guess where they’re going to spend their time and energy?!
[Thanks to Rob Cooper for this one.]