#and fighting with people since they don't have thr same values as you

[fishloop]

>#"fiction should explore dark things" and its just r4pe abo

you do realise abo is a slur against aboriginal australians and torres strait islanders right? if you're going to preach about how you're oh so unproblematic the least you can do is not be a fucking racist

hi! I'm not going to treat this as a competition on who's more problematic then who. I actually wasn't aware it was a slur as I don't frequent communities around a/b/o but I really appreciate you letting me know :)

thanks!

[danray002]

Part of me wonders how much of this is prevalent in private companies vs publicly-traded companies.

Disclosure: I'm not an economist, anything I write below here is just my musings, and I'd welcome feedback and clarification from anyone who has a more professional level of experiential/academic expertise on the matter.

From a lot of what I've seen in the modern investing space, the focus is primarily on the increase of an assets value. Also, despite the mantra most investors know about "previous performance doesn't guarantee future behavior," people are often more willing to put money into a venture which has some history of success in growth. So, while there could be other reasons to invest (dividends, voting rights on an organization about which the investor cares, activist investing opportunities, etc.), companies have been focused on proving to investors that they're worth investing in. Which, on paper, makes tons of sense, since not only is the company making more money by being more profitable, it also means it can sell its stock at a higher price and bring in more money from investors, which is kind of a second helping for that company.

The problem which comes up, though, is the threat of opportunity costs from failing to maintain ever-higher profits. If an investor purchases 10% of the stock early on in a publicly-traded company's history, that investor has a sizeable share of the company, both from an ownership standpoint and a monetary standpoint. Let's say the investor was right, and the company has done pretty well and seen 5-8% growth each year. Aside from dividends, the investor knows that the invested capital is growing pretty well, and that when it's time to retire, that investor can leave the money in the company for the most part, and slowly sell bit-by-bit for the rest of their life.

But what happens if the company stops producing so well? Maybe there's one year of slowed or stopped growth due to some unforeseen action in the markets, but what if it goes longer? Well, now the investor might start to worry, since two cycles at steady price when they could have been 5% compound growth would be a difference of about 10%. If this is supposed to support the investor long-term, then the investor might decide that it's time to find another company to invest in, and to sell of their shares of this company. And to do so effectively and efficiently may mean doing it quickly. This would mean a quick sale of 10% of the company, which would increase the amount of available shares and possibly signal to the markets that there's something wrong with this company, both of which could scare away buyers and push the price down. Price goes down, other investors want to sell and fewer want to buy, and before you know it, the company is trying to make some sweeping changes to its business model just to stop the bleeding and assure investors that they're still worth investing in.

So a little bit of stagnation cam snowball into some pretty sizable negative effects on the company, especially when they have to compete with tons of other investment vehicles (other companies, bonds, starting a business, etc.), some of which can potentially grow at faster rates, and they absolutely don't want to lose that fight. So rather than get caught up in the snowball downward, they do whatever they can to keep investors happy, and soon the company's method of maintaining the best financial outcome is less focused on more sales to customers, and more focused on keeping investment money inside and bringing in more.

So, like I mentioned earlier, I'd like to see how this holds up against companies that aren't publicly traded, and for whom the management/ownership groups don't have the same pressure to maintain certain investors' behaviors and have thr luxury of running thr business to focus on itself as a business rather than as a money-making vehicle for outside actors. Although I think most of those companies are going to be less transparent about how well they're doing, since the fact that they don't have public investors means they don't need to provide truthful financial info to the public in the same regard.

companies really have got to be okay with stagnant profits. what is wrong with earning the same amount every year? why does it always have to be more? it's not sustainable. there are only so many people on the planet you can profit from 😭