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Purdue Pharma files for bankruptcy with $10B plan to settle claims

bloomberg.com

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Re: Purdue Pharma files for bankruptcy with $10B plan to settle claims

#141

Post by Retric »

rjf72 wrote: post #115
simonh wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to the congressional report: “Purdue Pharma used front organizations and sponsored research to deceive the World Health Organization and corrupt global public health policies” If that is true and public policy was corruptly manipulated , how can you claim that this is all ok because it was allowed by public policy?

I do not agree with him, but I think you're making a much more salient point indirectly. Public policy that can be readily manipulated by bad actors (as the drug industry is certainly full of) should not be used as the final say for anything. Systems need to be able to tolerate: corruption, false information, and true but misleading information. Our regulatory systems in general seem to struggle with any of the above…

WHO is not a regulatory agency and does not have finally authority for anything. https://www.who.int/about/role/en/

Re: Purdue Pharma files for bankruptcy with $10B plan to settle claims

#142

Post by cies »

Gibbon1 wrote: post #118
cies wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's because of the "limited" of private limited. (Under capitalism) many costs of having PtLds are externalized.

> (Under capitalism) many costs of having PtLds are externalized. This is why I think the argument that a corporation only has a duty to it's stockholders is rank bullshit.

This is why that arguments holds out! They do not have duty to anyone else because of this. And I'm okay with that as long as the stockholders are punished (no silly slap on the wrist style punishments) for crimes of their PtLds, as then the owners will force toe PtLds to have serious ethical standards.

Re: Purdue Pharma files for bankruptcy with $10B plan to settle claims

#143

Post by cies »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #135
cies wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's because of the "limited" of private limited. (Under capitalism) many costs of having PtLds are externalized.

>(Under capitalism) many costs of having PtLds are externalized. I'd wager that at a societal level we roughly break even +/- a little bit in either direction. For every mega-corp abusing their legal status there's a few thousand small and medium businesses that do not have to worry (as much) about being sued into oblivion by some ambulance chaser over something that is not the result of malice. (I'm speaking about v…

So you think the climate going to shits is "roughly break even". Some have benefitted a lot from externalized costs wrt climate impact (made billions). And some have benefitted a little (fast transport modes becoming afordable for personal enjoyment).

Re: Purdue Pharma files for bankruptcy with $10B plan to settle claims

#144

Post by cies »

tomp wrote: post #126
NeedMoreTea wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a feature when it's good faith efforts. It's very clearly a bug when it's used to evade no end of abuse, illegality and fraud, or to avoid paying the pollution cleanup. There probably needs to be some exceptional way in law to pierce the shell of limited liability and go after officers, perhaps even claw back from investors and shareholders.

Limited liability only protects the capital of the shareholders , it doesn't protect the management of the company against criminal prosecution. (In practice, however, managers are only rarely put in jail, both because it's notoriously difficult to prove white-collar crime (except in few cases, like insider trading, which are the pursued with extra vigor), and because CEOs are generally rich and well connected... but…

Comparing a PtLd to a "personal business" the PtLd shields the owners from criminal liability for crimes committed by the PtLd, while the "personal biz" provides no such protection.

> Limited liability only protects the capital of the shareholders,

No, it also protects shareholders from crimes the PtLd commits in order to "serve them". This is a main problem with PtLds imho.

Re: Purdue Pharma files for bankruptcy with $10B plan to settle claims

#145

Post by vlan0 »

throwawayjava wrote: post #13
gibolt wrote: post #4

Looks like they got a golden escape hatch. Sounds like this arm of the company will end up controlled by a government trust. The best outcome would probably be the government running the operation at break even, lowering costs, and heavily regulating how much product it could give to hospitals.

Pierce the veil and go after the family.

I bet we could easily figure out where they live.

Re: Purdue Pharma files for bankruptcy with $10B plan to settle claims

#146

Post by danmaz74 »

cies wrote: post #140
danmaz74 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"limited" limits the amount of money investors can lose. It doesn't protect from criminal liability.

sorry have non-managing owners ever been targeted for crimes committed by their PtLds? nope they have not. and how about "personal business", yes, they are always targeted. this is a big differences... I think tomp is explaining this difference somewhere in this thread.

I think it all comes down to proving personal involvement with the crimes.

Re: Purdue Pharma files for bankruptcy with $10B plan to settle claims

#148

Post by gwright »

0x262d wrote: post #108
smhost wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

is that inherent? i haven't read Capital, but this doesn't seem so much of an inherent problem with capitalism than it seems like a very dumb implementation liability protection.

what capital says is that under capitalism, the ruling class will continually set up dumb rules, such as this one, in their favor, and they have a structural advantage in doing so, so are increasingly successful at it until it provokes revolt.

That isn't a characteristic of "capitalism". Sounds more like a characteristic of any power structure.

Re: Purdue Pharma files for bankruptcy with $10B plan to settle claims

#149

Post by mikeash »

darawk wrote: post #99
i_feel_great wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Epstein affair was not just Epstein the single individual. He could not have operated alone all these years in the way that he did. He got lenient sentences whenever he was brought to justice. The people who supported him remain untouchable.

Ok, but he was rich. And he got "touched". Therefore the rich are not untouchable, which was the original point under discussion. Just like the Sackler family does not appear to be immune from prosecution and confiscation of their property.

The rich are touchable if and only if they harm other rich people. See also: Bernie Madoff.

Re: Purdue Pharma files for bankruptcy with $10B plan to settle claims

#150

Post by dragonwriter »

cies wrote: post #97
grumpydba wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After all they are responsible for thousands of deaths. And they knew it. I don't know why they aren't in jail already.

That's because of the "limited" of private limited. (Under capitalism) many costs of having PtLds are externalized.

> (Under capitalism) many costs of having PtLds are externalized

Limited liability is directly as and exactly an externalization of costs; that's all that it is.

It's one that evolved hand in hand with capitalism, sure, but if it exists in a non-capitalist system it has the same effect.

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