If you stop smoking you'll feel better but it's not going to do anything to reduce smoking in the world overall. The only thing that can reduce smoking is the law: taxes, restrictions on where smoking is permitted, and so on.

You should still stop smoking (for your own good) but that alone won't change the world.

It does reduce smoking by one smoker.

A statistically insignificant reduction to the world population of smokers. Without laws to prevent tobacco marketing to minors, the cigarette industry could add 100x as many customers in a day.

Anything you do is statistically insignificant when compared to the world's population.

But if one person in an average household quits that is a 25% reduction.

In the end that person and those around benefit.

There are 4 smokers in an average household?!

You're restating a point I already made: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24203338

You should still stop smoking (for your own good)

Not for that smoker. They'll (statistically) live longer.

You're restating a point I already made: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24203338

You should still stop smoking (for your own good)

so does someone dying from lung cancer caused by a lifetime of smoking. tears in the rain

That makes sense but the same argument could apply to voting....

It does. If you really want something to change in the government, voting is pretty close to the bottom of the list of things you can do that might make a difference, statistically speaking. You still might as well vote, of course, but the chances of your one vote making an impact are extremely low.

That said, influencing the votes of other people can make a huge difference.

This has been my theory on why in some countries the extreme-right is doing very well (Belgium for example, with Vlaams Belang and NVA). These parties seem to understand that one vote doesn't change much in the grand scheme of things and that the key is to be able to convince a mass amount of voters at the same time. Hence why they are playing the modern media game and spending massive amounts of money into social media campaigns to reach a maximum amount of people. While other parties are not doing that (because they don't realize the game that is being played?) and it shows in election results.

"influencing the votes of other people" should probably be illegal, given the discussion about alledged mass manipulations on U.S. elections.

I consider that to be part of the point of voting. If everyone's opinion on societal matter produces a statistically significant effect, there will be endless turmoil.

That is true. And yet there aren't many good alternatives to voting if we want a free society.

This is one of the reasons why you have to lower the cost of voting as much as possible - in terms of time, money, and hassle - if you want broader participation.

I personally think politicians first and foremost need to try and restore trust in them by the people. I think the biggest reason for people to not vote these days is that they have already heard and seen confirmation for far too many lies. I used to go to every single election. Not anymore. It feels like a waste of my time. Not because the process is so complicated. No. It is a waste because we get lied to constantly anyway.

Don't underestimate the network effect that one person may have by quitting. By sharing their story with others on how they quit, it may inspire others to quit, and so on.

I'm pretty sure there is at least one MLM aka pyramid scheme that is bragging about being a B-Corp which they use to try and ensnare new victims. That's all you need to know to understand that the "B" in B-Corp stands for bullshit and steer well clear of any that explicitly brag about that status (if your business truly acts in a manner that makes the world better you wouldn't need to buy a bullshit certification to prove it).

I assumed that the B in b-corp stands for bullshit, but I checked. And the explanation is bullshit (label given to some companies which claim to care about stuff that matters), so unfortunately I was right and so was vmception: you can't believe in stuff because it's certified.

+1 - what's wrong with b-corps and what's better?

Winner’s Take All by Anand Giridharadas has a few chapters dedicated to B-corps. The issue isn’t that the b-corps themselves are bad, but that relying on a few good companies to fix the problems in the world isn’t going to work, because the bad actors will always more than make up for it.

Taking climate change as an example: 100 b-corps going carbon-neutral aren't going to offset the damage Exxon causes to the environment.

You can say we just need to wait until consumers change their behavior and let the market sort it out, but isn’t that exactly what we’ve been trying and failing to do? At this rate it’s all but certain that climate change won’t be solved via market solutions.

What’s better is forcing the bad actors to stop doing bad. Fighting to pass a carbon tax regulation or a green new deal is what we need, and bandaids like b-corps are often a distraction that tricks people into thinking we can consume our way out of the problem.

Sure but during the decades it will take to make generational change, why not support a B-Corp over one that hasn't made similar promises?

You are talking as if this is an either/or proposition. No, B-Corps won't solve our problems but if it moves the needle even a little, that's still a good thing, right?

I disagree that gaining support for and enacting a carbon tax would take decades. It won’t be easy, and maybe isn’t probable, but a mass movement could make it happen.

To your other point about private solutions being good because they move the needle a little:

In my personal life I shop sustainably (but I’m not perfect or obsessive about it). I do think it’s a little better as a consumer to make ethical choices than not to.

But: the rhetoric around climate change as something individual choices will fix is extremely dangerous. If you ask your average person about what we can do to fix climate change, I’d guess most would go straight to market solutions. Why is that? Could it be because that’s what the entire marketing and media establishment wants us to focus on, because a collective solution will cost them a shit-ton of money?

Yes in a different world it’s not either or and we’d have individual and collective solutions working together to save the planet. In this world, however, the powerful have a vested interest in market-based solutions being the only options on the table.

Basically, yes I agree that ethical companies are better than unethical companies. But on a macro level, propaganda around ethical consumption is so dangerous imo that I’m not interested in contributing to it just to move the needle an imperceptible amount.

Fighting to pass a carbon tax or green new deal is even less impactful than supporting b corps since those things will never get support from the corrupt political class rolling in what are essentially oil dollars.

That might be true! But there are many people working to unbalance that power dynamic as well.

It’s definitely not a guarantee, but mass movements can force change. Look at Bernie, he came pretty damn close to the nomination even with the entire upper class and media throwing their weight behind his opponents.

B Corporations do not have a legal status like a Benefit Corporation (or C or S corp), it's just a certification you buy.

which changes nothing either way if they were a Benefit Corporation.

Basically people use B-Corps and similar concepts to make other people that are uncomfortable and skeptical of general capitalism feel comfortable by pretending there are safeguards built into the corporate structure preventing whatever they are uncomfortable with.

Charters can easily change, anything can be reincorporated at whim anywhere.

Also its typically just Shariah-Compliant investing rebranded for an Islamaphobic audience. S&P has a shariah index right across the border in Toronto Stock Exchanfe since forever while similar enterprisers push B-Corps and Public Benefit Corporations domestically as if they’ve “figured out” the code to sustainable for profit ventures through charter. Shariah in this context is very compatible with what these kind of investors and consumers are looking for, but they don't know it as they probably conflate it with human rights abuses.

People are just gullible, hope I unpacked that enough.

I see exactly one merit in B-corporations: the status makes it legal for management to to decide in favor of conscience over greed. It doesn't force them to decide conscience over greed, they can be just as profit-oriented as a regular corporation, but they can. At least management won't be sued by shareholders for rejecting a an unethical but legal profit opportunity. It's not the big difference some may expect, but it can be an important difference nonetheless (just like it can be no difference at all)

It hasn't not been legal for a while.

https://www.lawschool.cornell.edu/academics/clarke_business_...

"Third, corporate directors are not required to maximize shareholder value. As the U.S. Supreme Court recently stated, "modern corporate law does not require for-profit corporations to pursue profit at the expense of everything else, and many do not do so." ( BURWELL v. HOBBY LOBBY STORES, INC. ) In nearly all legal jurisdictions, disinterested and informed directors have the discretion to act in what they believe to be the interest of the business corporate entity, even if this differs from maximizing profits for present shareholders. Usually maximizing shareholder value is not a legal obligation, but the product of the pressure that activist shareholders, stock-based compensation schemes and financial markets impose on corporate directors. The Shareholder Value Myth , Eur. Fin. Rev. Lynn Stout (April 30, 2013) The Ideology of Shareholder Value Maxim (Watch), Evonomics"

AFAIK, modern corporate law never required that, and the Supreme Court was affirming the existing state of things. The "Shareholder Theory" stems from an essay Milton Friedman published in 1970 asserting that corporations have no responsibility to do anything other than maximize shareholder value, but this was never enshrined in law or financial regulation -- it was just something a lot of corporations followed. It seems in the intervening decades it's become such an accepted "truth" that people assume that it's a legal requirement.

Yup and it was then largely popularized by Jack Welch former CEO of GE who is/was responsible for a lot of modern execs views on the matter.

There has never been a legal requirement for corporations to maximize profit. This is one of the greatest misconceptions propagated in the past 40 years.

A company's management has to act in the interest of shareholders, but that can be very loosely defined. A company that says "When making business decisions, we prefer protecting the environment over short-term profits, because our shareholders are humans living on Earth and without a good environment, our business would fail in the long-term" is not doing anything illegal. But if other companies don't follow suit, the eco-conscious company is in danger of being outcompeted.