Re:New bill ensures Jailtime for CEOs that lie
by kerkeslager on Thursday October 17, 2019 @02:48PM
(#21285191)
Ideally, limited liability wouldn't apply to people making decisions for the company: if a CEO decides, for example, not to recall deadly exploding cars because of a cost/revenue analysis, the CEO's 401k should not be off limits as a source of funds for a settlement against the company.
I don't know why you assume you benefit from this not being the case: when Ford was sued for the Pinto, shareholders of Ford lost money which they wouldn't have lost if the decision makers had paid more of the settlement.
One possible way to regulate this is related to voting and non-voting shares. If you want to invest in a company without taking on liability, you can invest in non-voting shares--since you can't make any decisions for the company, you can't be held liable if the company decides to do something wrong. But you shouldn't be able to take part in the decision making of a company without also taking responsibility if you decide to do something wrong.
I don't know why you assume you benefit from this not being the case: when Ford was sued for the Pinto, shareholders of Ford lost money which they wouldn't have lost if the decision makers had paid more of the settlement.
One possible way to regulate this is related to voting and non-voting shares. If you want to invest in a company without taking on liability, you can invest in non-voting shares--since you can't make any decisions for the company, you can't be held liable if the company decides to do something wrong. But you shouldn't be able to take part in the decision making of a company without also taking responsibility if you decide to do something wrong.