> execs could go to jail instead of just their company paying fines as if they're parking tickets?
You want to send an executive to jail for cancelling a contract?
I’d be curious for a jurisdiction to try this. In my opinion, I wouldn’t want to do business in a place where commercial disputes can be twisted by a political insider into jail time.
And that's rather the point. Apple earns a lot of money in the EU and much of that seems to be through abusing their position.
So yes, if you're the executive who signs off on something that is so clearly anticompetative, you should own the penalty. Ignorance of the law is not a defense.
No - you seem to be assuming such a law would only be invoked in cases where the company legitimately did something wrong. But that's not what's at stake here. We're talking about what happens when someone with political clout and a vendetta is able to use that law to wrongfully get a a CEO tossed in prison. Because sometimes laws get twisted for personal gain, and you're raising the stakes pretty high.
I wouldn't want to do business under those conditions, not because I might violate the law, but because it could be used wrongfully against me.
Considering how impactful some executive decisions can be why would this be so inconceivable? A CEO can definitely cause more harm to a community than a shoplifter and we have no qualms about sending them to jail. If there was a clear mens rhea to cause harm or awareness of that harm and a disregard for the consequences to others then why shouldn't we treat it similarly?
> If there was a clear mens rhea to cause harm or awareness of that harm and a disregard for the consequences to others then why shouldn't we treat it similarly?
Yes, and we do. That’s well below the threshold of commercial disputes.
Do you want to send executives to jail when their products kill people? The line has to be drawn somewhere, and if there is no (functioning) regulatory oversight then businesses will absolutely not self-regulate.
PG&E caused the death of hundreds and the loss of hundreds of homes, and they've done it multiple times. Is there regulatory oversight because I'm not seeing it. They will happily cut corners in the name of profit even if it means killing people.
Fair enough, no jail time then but how about the personal liability in money. You fuck up, it's your own money you gotta pay with, not the company's bottomless war-chest.
> it's your own money you gotta pay with, not the company's
I agree with this, and it could be constructed out of shareholder rights. Perhaps it could only be applied past a certain threshold of compensation, say, 100x the median wage. ($4.6mm [1].)
I’d argue the threshold should be final, unappealable regulatory penalty or criminal conviction of the corporation.
> why does personal responsibility for harm to others bother you?
Personal responsibility is irrelevant. You’re constructing a lower threshold for criminality. I know the first thing I’d be trying to figure out is how to put my competitors in jail.
Let’s take Epic v Apple. Epic went to court. It lost. This entire saga has cost Epic’s shareholders billions. Should Sweeney go to jail? Would the world be better if an Apple-friendly prosecutor could take up that challenge?
If we have a cultural failing in America, it’s having a reflexive urge to turn outrage into jail time.
> Provide an incentive for companies to regulate each other
Do you think there is a reason every modern democracy resists privatising criminal prosecution? (They had it in Rome. We probably need a history of law section in the basic high-school curriculum.)
The justice system in this hypothetical would not be private, it's just that companies would be trying to sue each other for breaking the rules, accidentally advancing the public interest.
This is a bogus modernist interpretation that dilutes the meaning of violence. Fortunately, it’s being rejected after having a moment that peaked during lockdown.
You want to send an executive to jail for cancelling a contract?
I’d be curious for a jurisdiction to try this. In my opinion, I wouldn’t want to do business in a place where commercial disputes can be twisted by a political insider into jail time.