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Comment by Eddy_Viscosity2 | Hacker News Reader

Exactly, fining companies doesn't do anything. Fine and jail the PEOPLE doing these crimes.

There's always plausible deniability so that if anybody does take the fall it's probably going to be some mid level suit that was 'just following orders.' I'd rather that liability starts with the CEO and Chairman. You need to make sure executives cannot simply hide behind fallguys.

You then create a top-down incentive for these people to genuinely make sure everything is on the up and up. The biggest problem is that this probably creates a strict cap on how large a single corporation can grow, which sounds much more like a feature than a bug.

This is all well and good to say, but impossible to implement within our current system. That's what's so depressing about it. And by 'impossible' I grant its theoretically possible, just not in practical terms. Of course the other side of the coin is that even if it was implemented, then prosecutors, and hence government, would now have this new power over CEOs and it wouldn't be long before some corrupt politician got in office and used it corruptly.

Sarbanes-Oxley would seem to imply that it’s possible to enact new laws that enforce consequences for fraud among top level executives?

In theory at least I guess. Maybe someone else can comment on how it actually works in practice.

Its not enough for the laws to exist, they must also be enforced.

>I'd rather that liability starts with the CEO and Chairman. You need to make sure executives cannot simply hide behind fallguys.

Why can't you appoint a fall guy as the "CEO", and then have a COO or whatever that actually runs the day to day?

Even c-levels, including the CEO, can be fired by the board, which is why I think accountability should include such.

Okay, then you have a whole c-suite of fall guys, and the real CEO is actually called "VP of global operations" or whatever.

I prefer jail time for companies. The entire operation has to shut down for a set period of time. No money going in or out. No one can work. No one can open their laptop. No one can go in the office. No one can discuss business. No new contracts signed.

If corporations have the same rights as humans, make them suffer the same consequences.

So all of the employees get fired en masse, but the rich CEO, managers and shareholders actually responsible for malfeasance get an extended vacation?

Yeah... that'll show them.

The effective outcome of corporate jailtime is that the company is instantly destroyed. There are no companies that would survive being shit down for years. Shareholders would be left with nothing.

And if people would be out of jobs - good. It would stop people from working for companies that don't provide transparency into the legality of their operations.

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