The business corporation is among the most remarkable of all human innovations. Corporations are warring armies battling for supremacy in markets. The resulting symbiosis between command and competition has proved very fruitful. The unprecedented economic development seen since the middle of the 19th century would have been impossible without the resources and organisational capacities of that great invention — the limited liability joint-stock company.
在人类的所有创新中，商业公司是最了不起的。公司就是交战的军队，不断争夺着市场霸权。事实证明，由此产生的控制与竞争并存是卓有成效的。如果没有“有限责任股份公司”这一伟大发明的资源和组织能力，那么19世纪中叶以来前所未有的经济发展将是不可能出现的。
Yet, as Colin Mayer of Oxford university’s Saïd Business School argues in a remarkable and radical new book, Prosperity , all is not well with the corporation. The public at large increasingly views corporations as sociopathic and so as indifferent to everything, other than the share price, and corporate leaders as indifferent to everything, other than personal rewards. Judged by real wages and productivity, their recent economic performance has been mediocre. Furthermore, corporations have been allowed to corrode competition, as Jonathan Tepper and Denise Hearn argue in another important new book, The Myth of Capitalism . In short, bad ideas have seized the corporation and let competition waste away.
然而，正如牛津大学(Oxford University)赛德商学院(Saïd Business School)的科林•迈耶(Colin Mayer)在一本出色、激进的新书《繁荣》(Prosperity)中所主张的那样，公司并不尽如人意。广大民众越来越认为公司是反社会的，除了股价以外，公司对所有事情都漠不关心；而公司领导人除了个人奖励外，也对所有事情都漠不关心。从实际工资和生产率来看，公司最近的经济表现一直平庸。此外，公司还被允许腐蚀竞争，这是乔纳森•泰珀(Jonathan Tepper)和丹尼丝•赫恩(Denise Hearn)在另一本重要的新书《资本主义的神话》(The Myth of Capitalism)中的观点。简而言之，公司已经满脑子坏主意，让竞争日渐衰弱。
Prof Mayer’s main target is Milton Friedman’s argument that the purpose of companies is only to make profits, subject to law and (minimal) regulation. Today, this is presented as the obligation to maximise shareholder value. Behind this is the view, which goes back to Adam Smith, that the principal challenge is the “agency problem” — the relationship between owners and agents (the managers). “The problem with the Friedman view,” insists Prof Mayer, “is that it is hopelessly naive.” It is based on “simple and elegant economic models that simply do not hold in practice”.
迈耶教授主要针对的是米尔顿•弗里德曼(Milton Friedman)的观点，即公司的目标只是赚取利润，受法律和（最低）监管的约束。今天，这一观点体现为公司有义务最大化股东价值。这背后隐含的可追溯至亚当•斯密(Adam Smith)的观点是，主要难题是“代理问题”：所有者和代理人（即公司管理者）之间的关系。迈耶教授坚信，“弗里德曼观点的问题在于太过天真”。这个观点是基于“简单而优美的经济模式，在现实中根本无法成立”。