moral

Bill Gates was back in the news this week for his comments on personal and corporate tax. Here's the high order bit: "This is not a morality thing, this is about the law".

The backdrop for Gates' comments was Tim Cook's widely covered recent testimony before the Senate on Apple's tax strategy.

Gates is right. It can't be a morality thing. Corporations are not moral entities. What code could we possibly expect them to follow if not the law?

Now that we have got that straight, can someone tell me why amoral political expenditures by these unthinking corporate creatures are protected speech?

Nobody expects my dog to do anything but chase cars and dilligently lower his tax bill. My dog's speech is not protected even when translated. Why is corporate speech?

I'm not a rabid anti-capitalist hippie or a dog hater. A sole proprietor or partners in a partnership are certainly entitled to the same protections on their speech whether commercial or private. What I don't understand is a why a magical structure, the corporation, that exists solely to limit the liability of passive investors and thereby attract investment, should require such an expansive blanket of rights.

If I own a dental practice together with two other dentists in a general partnership and we use a radio spot to defame the unhygienic foreign oral surgeon down the road, we're jointly liable for any judgement against the practice without limit. I could lose everything. I could lose more than everything.

If Facebook defames the unhygienic foreign oral surgeon down the road, Mark Zuckerberg stands only to lose the value of his stake in Facebook. His losses are capped somewhere in the neighborhood of $30 billion. He probably gets to keep the house.

Let's agree that corporations are not moral creatures. Let's continue to limit shareholder liability. Let's also agree on a more appropriate grant of rights to corporations that recognizes their peculiar and amoral nature.

In the meantime, dog owners should probably get a corporation to own their dogs for them so that they can enjoy the same limits on liability they have for the shares in their retirement account.