They should be nationalized to become an even better revenue stream
Tesla may do any number of shady or illegal things but without Musk and his vested interest in the company it would probably be a footnote in some corporate obituary.
- The shareholders shouldn't necessarily be held responsible because most have no input or knowledge when it comes to any shady business.
- The company would perform worse because without the drive for profit (and whatever gray means they use to achieve them) that most private entrepreneurs have, the company would almost definitely perform worse. Privatized companies usually run better because the state might be a good minority shareholder but not the best when it comes to driving a company.
Otherwise you incentivize hiring fall guys to do a crime and go to prison, while the shareholders profit off of their crimes
Take your bank as an example. You gave them the money they used to commit whatever illegality and you profited from it. Now imagine the state takes over and only pays you a fraction of your deposits.
Worse yet, it incentivizes the shareholders to try to keep things hidden where today they would likely sue the company or CEO.
Otherwise the argument "companies need free speech and rights because they're just extensions of the owners few speech and rights" makes no sense, because the owners have no actual say in what's going on
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Why would investors sue the ceo when nothing bad will happen to them? How do they even have standing when the ceo does wrong if shareholders are indemnified?
In this banking example, it would be my fault for picking a poor quality bank? I'd also expect that the fine isn't going to be that much more than double the profits I made, so maybe $100-$1000? It's not like im making much money on my savings in a bank.