Introduction
A corporation is a legal entity, incorporated through a registration process established through legislation. The incorporated units have liabilities and legal rights that are separate from their shareholders and employees. Through the given rights, a corporation may conduct its business either as a profit-oriented business or a non-profit business. In recent years, many countries are moving towards globalization. However, the move is accompanied by criticism since globalization is feared to be corporate-led.
This because, as corporations grow larger and become multinational, so does their interests and their influence. For example, out of the 100 largest economies in the world, 49 are countries and 51 are corporations (Keigher and Christine 153).
This said, some of the choices corporations make to enhance their profitability can affect people all over the world. Today, many corporations are known for their good and bad influence in people’s lives. As globalization takes over, the marginalized people are becoming particularly angry with the activities of multinational corporations. For this reason, globalization is being met with increasing resistance and protests globally (Longinos, Salvador and Alicia 39). This is because they leave people wondering when corporations gained so much power and the impacts of giving corporations the same rights as individuals especially in the United States. American corporations affect the American people both directly and indirectly. While American corporations are becoming multibillion franchises around the world and improving the global economy, they have a considerable impact on Americans in terms of how they shape their behavior, attitudes and well being.
Influences of Corporations on the People of United States
Firstly, corporations are influential in the country’s economy, which affects every American. In the US, corporations support government initiatives to enhance economic growth through various ways. For instance, they help create employment, in the country, which is crucial in improving people’s standards of living. Indeed, private corporations, in the country, employ more persons than the government (Samuels and Arthur 48). Further, corporations pay vast amounts of taxes to the government, therefore, enhancing the delivery of public goods by the government. In the US, corporations lead as the main sources of government revenue, which demonstrates their significance, in the country. In addition, corporations are instrumental in developing new technologies that not only help create employment in technology industries, but also enhance people’s quality of life.
Secondly, corporations blur the boundary between the private and public sector (Warren and Miller 187). There are factors that lead to the blurring of the boundary between these two crucial sectors. For one, there is an extensive cooperation between non-governmental and governmental sectors on various issues. Since the enactment of corporate laws, the struggle for power has been a battle between big business and the government. In recent years, the interaction between these sectors is institutionalized and cooperative such that they appear to work together as one scale exerting influence on the individual. Secondly, nature and the impacts of actions taken by private units on their own have lasting impacts on the general population. For instance, the rules enacted by telephone companies, credit card companies, banks and so forth affect every individual. The services rendered by these companies are necessary for conducting business, as well as enhancing societal functions. Therefore, everyone has to confine to their rules. The third factor is the alleged dominance of private elites in public life (Triebwassern n.p).
Further, corporate organizations, in America, often undermine the country’s democracy, which affects every American. One way they do this is by evading tax. Without paying tax, democracy often struggles to function and the government is unable to provide public services. Companies are required to pay tax, but some multinational corporations are able to pay ingenious lawyers and accountants who have figured out ways to evade enormous amounts of tax. Some companies are, therefore, able to get away with tax evasion even with the possibility of facing jail time if caught.
Consequently, the government taxes the population further since it needs to make up for the lost revenue from businesses that evade tax (Marin, Ruiz and Rubio 70). In this regard, the average individual is adversely affected since his/her disposable income decreases. Secondly, they are extremely influential in public policy making. Many Americans think that the government exclusively makes public policy. In reality, some influential private organizations, especially the large-scale corporations, play a direct role in the making of government policies mainly through extensive lobbying especially within Congress. This undermines the country’s democracy as it limits the people’s voice by influencing the decisions of the people’s representatives. Therefore, public policy often tends to favor corporations at the people’s expense. Public policy making is defined as the authoritative allocation of values, in society. This means that public policy making has three facets: authority, binding decisions and the allocation of resources to members of the society. These resources may be in the form of goods, services, statuses, costs, opportunities and honors among others (Marin, Ruiz and Rubio 70). Further, a corporation makes binding decision through the process called situational abidingness, which tend to limit people’s choices. This is achieved by limiting the consumer’s choices. For instance, when buying an airline ticket for travelling between two points, o e encounters several airlines competing, in the market, but they all charge a considerably high price. The simple fact here is that one either buys the product or service at the producer’s stipulations, or they do not buy at all. The consumers have no choice, but to be bound by the producers’ decisions…
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