
Government Sachs - andrenth
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/government-sachs-lind
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amadeuspagel
I'm far from the inane "it's a private company, they can do whatever they
want" view so common here, but this strikes me as a bad example of abuse of
corporate power:

> But now Goldman Sachs has announced that it will not assist companies in
> initial public offerings (IPOs) if they have all-male boards. As this
> example suggests, if you cannot get the legislature or a democratically
> accountable government department or independent agency to pass your policy,
> you can try to persuade the major corporations and banks which dominate U.S.
> economic life to act as though your proposed policy was already the law of
> the land. The end justifies the means.

As far as I understand, assisting companies in initial public offerings is not
just an infrastructure function, rather it means selling their stock to your
clients. Suppose Goldman Sachs thinks, for whatever reason, that all-male
boards make systematically worse decisions. Then they would be violating their
duty to their clients, by selling them the stocks of companies with all-male
boards.

The "build your own x" argument, often made in bad faith, is really
appropriate here. If you disagree with goldman sachs, you don't even have to
build your own anything, you can just invest in the IPOs run by other
financial institutions.

