Joe Biden gave a hell of a speech in Pennsylvania today. As I was listening I heard words that I’ve been waiting for a presidential nominee to say for 40 years:
“It’s way past time to put the end to the era of shareholder capitalism. The idea the only responsibility a corporation has is its shareholders — that is simply not true, it’s an absolute farce. They have a responsibility to their workers, their community, to their country.”
(I could only find a direct written quote on Breitbart, and I refuse to link to them, but these are the words he said.)
Ever since 1980, the horrific philosophy that corporations are responsible only to shareholders — pushed by Milton Friedman, re-enforced by the writings of Ayn Rand, and put into a governing philosophy by Ronald Reagan — has dominated the country. Republicans championed it, but Democrats too often helped it along as well. It is the philosophy that has driven record levels of income inequality — obscene wealth contrasted with dire poverty and a shrinking middle class.
I give credit to Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders for challenging that narrative and trying to return us to a time when corporations had to answer to all of their stakeholders. And I give tremendous credit to Biden to listening to them (I’m pretty sure Warren had a big hand in this) and articulating this loud and clear as our presumptive nominee. The whole speech was unabashedly pro-worker, pro-union, and rightly focused on “buy American” policies. Go Joe!