 Thank you for that round of applause. I am Gene F. Gene director of the Soho forum and Without further ado because we have a lot to cover in this debate. I want to introduce our two debaters speaking for the affirmative Yarn Brook, please come to the stage Yarn Brook, please come to the stage Speaking for the negative John Mackie, please come to the stage If you if you don't know who these guys are then look it up Because I don't have any time to tell you I only have to tell you that they disagree deeply about certain aspects of how business to conduct itself Even though they agree about many other things most things in fact But the resolution reads the only purpose of business is to maximize long-term profits Yarn you have ten minutes to speak for the affirmative take it away. Yarn is the mic on David. Yeah. Thank you Afternoon everybody. I hope you had a good lunch. So we all know oh the capitalism is under attack indeed on every front We're chipping away at the last remnants of capitalism in America today in politics in culture and now in business as well The business round table recently has declared that it's not the purpose of business to maximize Shareholder wealth long-term shareholder wealth long-term profits long-term value creation The purpose of business now is to balance a variety of different stakeholders and to maximize some kind of stakeholder idea of capitalism of course many have pounced on this notion and You can see their their movements The ESG movements and other types of movements rallying around us So we just got you know, I think four new or three new directors on the board of Exxon who are advocates of Turning Exxon into a I guess a solar panel company We're seeing woke culture being introduced into business and we're seeing the rise of what many are calling woke capitalism All through this gap that has said you don't have to worry about shareholders. You don't have to worry about maximizing shoulder wealth Your responsibilities at the society is large and then we fill in the blank of what that means John might meet well in what he wants to fill in with them But the ESG movement and many of the movements out there They don't They don't care about capitalism. They don't care about freedom. They don't care about business They want their social agenda in every aspect of American life and business is maybe the last one to fall Let's not let that happen. I Believe the role of business business is a unique institution if you want to advocate for social causes You can start a nonprofit You can even start a business called a corp be where the corporation in advance says we're not going to maximize shareholder wealth We're not going to be about profits. We're going to do something else. You can organize that way But a standard normal business a corporation is an institution organized around value creation and the measure of value creation is profit how much You add to the world How much you add to people's well-being is in the end measured by how much money you make When you make a lot of money, it means your customers are buying your product. They value your product so much so much more Then what a costume to produce So you make a large profit. I Think profit is cool It means that you've added you've created something that didn't exist before And of course to make a profit now make a profit John knows us better than I do. He's made many more profits than I have To make profit is hard work Requires real effort a lot of thinking it requires massive coordination You have to figure out who to hire how much to pay them how well to treat them In the context of how they will help you make a profit You have to go on and hire suppliers which suppliers where what's the supply chain gonna look like? Where do they come from? How do you treat them? Well, you have to treat them in the context and choose them in the context of how do they help you? make a profit and Of course, you have to treat customers just right Now you could say we have to treat them wonderfully. Yes Some companies that's the business model, but at Walmart. They don't treat you wonderfully, but they provide customers of value Maybe through cheaper prices. Maybe through less customer service But people love Walmart because they get a value from war what so what's the context by which you decide How to treat your customers? How well to treat them? How will you produce a profit? And if you treat your customers badly, we know we know you're not gonna make money Making money requires you provide a value it requires value creation So American business has been incredibly successful focus on this business model of Taking all these elements out there so I might as five minutes five minutes. Yes suppliers and customers and Every one of these groups out there the community they which they live and treating them appropriately within the context of making money and the wealth we have today the variety of products we have today The benefits that we all enjoy from the world of business out there is a result of Companies pursuing profit mechanism maximization a result of companies realizing that They're in business Because They're in business and they have certain owner owners, right? One of the one of the other reasons I am big on Profit maximization a shareholder what maximization is really this issue of property rights, right? Somebody owns the business we recognize in the law and I think in our common culture that shareholders own the business That's what a stock means. It's a piece of ownership Well, what's your job as a manager working for an owner? Is it to pursue your social purposes your social goals? No It's the maximize the benefit to the owner to the shareholder To the person who hired you To manage and run the business these ideas I think are at the core of capitalism at the core of Freedom and at the core of what will be necessary To continue to defend the little that's left of capitalism and freedom in America today So let's not give it up Let's Re-invigorate a defense of what profit means profit doesn't mean Exploitation Profit doesn't mean not caring about your workers and your customers profit doesn't mean squandering Profit means the creation of value And we all benefit from that because remember as a customer As a supplier as an employee Your relationship with a healthy business is a win-win relationship You benefit and they benefit they make money You either make money as a supplier you make money as an employee or you get the product that you're willing to pay for as a customer But business is about win-win relationships. It's not about exploitation. It's not about taking advantage It's about a business creating something you want and are willing to pay more for two minutes two minutes more for Then what you know, so you're willing to pay it you give up dollars Because the product you're getting is worth more to you than the dollars that you're giving up who lost We all win so free focus Undefending profit Undefending the freedom of businesses to maximize value for us To maximize value for themselves to maximize the profits for their owners Everybody wins in The long run everybody wins But in order to manage a complex business one has to have an integrating principle and the integrating principle The only integrating principle that makes sense in my view the only integrating principle that provides us with the kind of One melody that we benefit from one minute is the principle of profit magnet maximization, which again profit is a result of creating value You don't make money unless you create something that the customers want and the customers are willing to buy Farm you right And enough of a price that you make money off of it 30 seconds. Let's not give up on that. Thank you all okay Thank you Again the resolution reads the only purpose of business is to maximize long-term profits Speaking for the negative John Mackie ten minutes. Take it away John so Let's look at this resolution the only Purpose of business is to maximize long-term profits The key word is only I'm not going to argue against profits. I Mean the reality is I started a business 43 years ago with forty five thousand dollars Two employees my girlfriend and myself and today 43 years later We have five hundred and thirty stores doing twenty one billion dollars in sales and we've made billions of dollars of profits And yet profits has never been the major goal profits have become as a result of creating value for customers I Want to argue that profit is not the only purpose of business and Profit is not even the primary purpose of business This isn't about woke capitalism That's appealing to the audience and putting in something. I'm not going to talk about or don't support Business creates value for multiplicity of yes stakeholders. It creates value for its customers It creates value for its employees. It creates value for its suppliers It creates value for its investors and it creates value for the communities. It's part of all of those things There's a complexity to business. It's not a simple morality tale of good versus evil saints versus sinners Business is part of society. It's an important part of society when you combine scientific breakthroughs with Business and entrepreneurial capitalism. You get the great Prosperity that's happened in the world in the last 250 years ago Business is fundamentally good because it creates value for customers and for all of its stakeholders Business is ethical because it's based on voluntary exchange for mutual gains and benefits and Business is heroic because it has lifted billions of people out of poverty and has led to what Deidre McCloskey calls the great enrichment Now I want you to consider all the professions that we have in the world today in America. Let's take doctors is doctors purpose to maximize profits Of course not the purpose of doctors is to heal people. That's their purpose They do a good job doctors are well compensated, but their purpose is not to maximize their profits teachers educate people Architects design buildings engineers construct things every one of the Professions refers back to some type of value creation that they're doing for other people. That's their purpose The result of fulfilling that purpose is they make money. It's no different with business Consider the fact that great companies have great purposes. Let's look at some of those purposes Tesla To accelerate the world's transition to sustainable energy Linked in to connect the world's professionals to make them more productive and successful PayPal to build the web's most convenient secure cost-effective payment solution Amazon which owns Whole Foods to be Earth's most customer-centric company where customers can find and discover Anything they want might want to buy online endeavors to offer its customers the lowest possible prices Nike bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world if you have a body You are an athlete Nordstrom to give customers the most compelling shopping experience possible Patagonia build the best product Calls no unnecessary harm use business to inspire and implement solutions to environmental crisis Finally Whole Foods market our purpose is to nourish people and the planet What do these great companies know that yarn Brook doesn't know they know that maximizing long-term profits is Not the primary purpose of business the purpose of business is to create value for customers Profits is something that results from that. It's not the purpose. He's putting the cart before the horse consider the fact I have red blood cells if My body doesn't produce red blood cells. I'm going to die it doesn't logically follow that because I Have red blood cells that the purpose of my life is to produce red blood cells Seminarily business must make money or it will die But it doesn't logically follow that that's why it exists. It doesn't exist to make profits Profits are an effect of creating value for other people. He's got it backwards five minutes five minutes Profit and purpose are not opposites. They're linked together Profit is something that is important to business, but it's not the primary reason business exists As a business person, let's imagine for example example that whole foods was just articulate Oh, our our higher purpose is to maximize long-term profits some Employee comes to work in the first day. We say hey, welcome to Whole Foods Your job while you're here is to maximize profits Now what do you think is going to be more inspiring and motive and your people your purpose at Whole Foods is to nourish? People in the planet or to make as much money to the shareholders as possible similarly, do you think you're going to have inspired customers if you put up on your in your stores like Whole Foods puts up our higher purpose in the stores and we say Maximizing shareholder value. We're maximizing profits. That's why we exist So glad you're shopping here today to help us do that. I Want you to consider the many business scandals that have happened over the last 30 years And most of them have occurred under the idea that the purpose of business is to maximize shareholder value long-term shareholder value In Ron and Arthur Anderson cooking the books and misleading the public Which cost tremendous social harm and ultimately destroyed both companies or volkswag him lying about their diesel emissions and then trying to cover it up British petroleum cutting their safety protocols in order to make more money Ignoring the many warnings that their engineers gave them that they shouldn't be doing it that doing so would Significantly increase the risk of a major oil spill and that resulting in the largest oil spill in the history of the world Wells Fargo creating millions of fraudulent savings and checking accounts for clients without their consent Philip Morris RJ Reynolds and the other tobacco companies working for decades Decades to cover up the harmful effects of smoking the fact that it shortens our lives leads to cancer union carbides careless gas leak in india which led to harming over 500,000 people and killed 3787 people directly these are just a few of the terrible scandals that have happened for businesses whose stated purpose was to maximize long-term profits When we make that our goal We actually send a signal to the management that you know maximizing the management's compensation is Becomes management's goal and then taking the shortcuts that undermines the integrity of the business is usually and frequently happens Let's contrast That human profit as the higher maximizing profit is the higher purpose with what Mike Roman CEO of 3M had to say Great and enduring companies are driven by purpose and they build build the company on a foundation of trust Trust from our customers employees partners Shareholders and communities at 3M. We cannot break that trust ever If companies are built on higher purposes, it is far more likely Far more likely this is the paradox. It is far more likely that they will Maximize long-term shareholder value. They will maximize profits over the long term by having a higher purpose. I have known Hundreds of entrepreneurs in my lifetime. It's been my privilege to know entrepreneurs like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates one minute one minute These guys are the richest people in the world and I promise you not one of them. Is that what they mostly care about? That's not what's driven them. What's driven them? He talked to someone like Elon Musk the guy's on fire He wants to help humanity to move forward He wants to create a better planet a more sustainable future for all of us and yet the guy's worth over a hundred billion dollars And yet that wasn't his goal. That's not what he set out to do 30 seconds he set out to create Value for his customers and to fulfill a more transcendent purpose the result of that Paradoxically is that we create more profits wasn't thank you very much Thank you John We are gonna go to the rebuttal portion, but I want to tell you in advance that there will be a 12 minute Q&A section Which is why we have two mics another aisle So if you're gonna have a question think about it as you're listening to the rebuttals four minutes for rebuttal take it away Yeah, so how well did the companies that cook the books? Maximize shareholder wealth. How well did they do in terms of long-term profits? I would argue that exact opposite. It's because they didn't focus on Maximizing long-term shareholder wealth. It's because they didn't focus on maximizing profits That they found themselves doing things that actually eliminated profitability destroyed businesses destroyed Shareholders and landed them up in jail. That's called short-term thinking not long-term wealth and value creation of Course Businessmen are motivated by a variety of different purposes Yes, I agree entrepreneurs don't go into business with the goal the sole goal of making money But the only way to make their money the company viable The only way to integrate the vast amount of information that they have in order to produce in order to create the values that customers want is To focus on profit. I mean Apple has a very nice mission statement And yet the profit margin on these things Is 50% Now I don't begrudge them that this is worth a lot more than I paid for it So I'm happy to get it and the fact is that they make that money and they reinvest it and they produce other beautiful products that I then consume What integrates them is not You know, whatever that mission statement is that's nice that motivates that drives them But what integrates their decision-making? What integrates how they actually function when integrates the trade-offs they have to make between Different decisions. I mean imagine you have to close a plant in Chicago Because it's too expensive to do business say and move it to South Dakota because it's much cheaper to do business two minutes two minutes. I Mean, what about the employees in Chicago? They're gonna lose their jobs They're gonna suffer They're not gonna win in the short run We please in South Dakota, but they knew do you take them into account? This idea of stakeholder Utility maximizing. How do you actually weigh the different considerations? How do you weigh the different stakeholders? Well, the way you do it is you optimize around Profits and I know it's uncomfortable to think about that because we live in a culture that this demonized the idea of profit But it's the only way in which we can integrate the vast information the vast trade-offs That we have to do in business in order to achieve Whatever it is that this particular business is focused on achieving and there's no question Every business is focused within its realm. It has to be focused on a particular realm Particular industry particular set of products particular set of customers in order to achieve something one minute when the value creation But the only way that can be achieved is a ruthless focus on what is going to produce Financial results long term shareholder wealth and that I would add is also their fiduciary legal responsibility They are the representatives of the owners. They can't just do whatever they want They can't you motivate an employee when he comes in around some higher purpose got to help your customers But you're not going to tolerate him just giving the product away because he's trying to help products customers It's within the context of profit. Was that it? Oh, you have 20 seconds. Oh confusing The context is yes, you want to do you want to be amazing to a customer if you're at Whole Foods within the context of Whole Foods has to make money is going to make money. It's trying to maximize how much it makes for its owners So it's not it is the only purpose of business. That's the proposition right only But under that only all these subcategories of things that have to happen So that you can only maximize shareholder wealth five seconds over five seconds over you get an extra five seconds John Take it away. I love competing with guys like yarn Brooks and business We eat them up for lunch. Hope they they're unable to motivate their employees They do not create loyalty with their customers. They don't understand the interdependencies of stakeholders. They're easy to defeat in business How many of you read the Lord of the Rings or saw the movies? Yes He believes in the one ring One ring to rule them all one ring to find them and one ring to bring them all and in the darkness blind them yarn believes that profits That will Unite everything together and we'll do everything right because profits is is we make that the goal and we'll make it all work You know, you can take any of the stakeholders and say exactly the same thing Let's say my goal was to maximize Customer value and satisfaction now. I couldn't do that if I didn't make a lot of money Have to get the money in order to create more stores And but the goal is is to maximize customer satisfaction as many customers as possible You can build the business around the customers That can be the one ring that rules them all or you could do it with the employees as well. I want to maximize Team member happiness at Whole Foods So I have to make a lot of money to do that so we can create more stores and hire more people and create more value All of the stakeholders are interdependent. He doesn't understand that he thinks they're at war with each other There's some kind of massive trade-offs going on all the time But when you're running a business a complex business, you have to take all of the stakeholders into account You have to create Simultaneously value for customers for your team members for your suppliers For your shareholders for your investors in the communities that were part of these things are not in isolation They're connected together and I can tell you from my personal experience and business and from all the great entrepreneurs I've known that when we have a transcendent purpose That unites it all far better Far far better than focusing on maximizing just profits for the investors and in fact when When you compete against somebody like that to us generally their businesses don't underperform That's been my experience and as I pointed out There's a tendency when you focus on profits that sends the wrong Communication to your employees your customers and all the other stakeholders the management team can become crony capitalist They begin to drift away from the higher purpose of the business they begin to think about their own personal profits How do I maximize my profits as a management as a CEO and so they're off track? Profit is not the best way to buy it. Would you want to go to a doctor? Who you didn't feel like their main goal was to help you get healthy, but their main goal was to get as much money out of you as possible With that we'd like our medical system to be like that or our teachers They're just trying to extract more money out of us because to maximize their profits. No Profits if that's the main goal It's easy to drift away from what really matters in business and what really matters is creating value for our customers Profits are a result of that. They aren't the purpose themselves and that's where he and I disagree Thank you very much. Oh, okay Okay, that was record time. Thank you, John We now move to the Q&A portion of the evening I'm going to stand over here and I'm oops. Yeah, it's good. We've got some good people I'm going to I'm going to ration you two debaters to only one question that you can ask of the other You cannot you can exercise that option at any time But if you want to wave it and wait for audience question looks like yarn wants to wave it and wait for audience questions But although you can exercise that option later wait audience questions John you want a question I have a question for yarn if I can lay it on it That's the only question John good. That's we are here's my question Do you believe that Ein Rand's major heroic characters and Atlas should such as Henry Reardon, Dagny Taggart John Galt in Francisco, D'Anconia were primarily motivated by maximizing profits or bore my by more transcendent purposes As an entrepreneur to me It's obvious that each of these passionate and heroic characters were driven by purposes that went way beyond only maximizing profits Take Henry Reardon is the best example. What drove him to work 20 hours a day? Will you just to maximize the profits of rears and steel? No, the guy was clearly motivated to create a better product. I think we understand your question That's my question. Do you really believe these do you believe Henry Reardon was primarily motivated to maximize profits? Or did he have some other transcendent purpose? Okay, okay, John. You just ask the question That's my question. That's my question John just asked to ask the question and he answered it. But what's your answer? Go ahead. Oh Yeah, you're I can't hear you Oh, sorry. No, I think the the the the purpose of the individual the purpose of the individual up an entrepreneur The purpose of the individual CEO the purpose of the individual manager is clearly not particularly not focused primarily on profit But the business so Hank Reardon in the context of the business He is motivated his day-to-day motivation is clearly about producing and creating and everything But you know, he has this interchange with Dagny a few if you've already had a shrug and if you haven't you really should He has this interchange with Dagny where she really needs the metal, right? And he could sell it to her pretty much for any you know for any price and he does He charges her a price where he gets a real profit on what he's done So what is motivating his business decisions is Profit what motivates him in terms of his actions on a day-to-day basis. Yes, he has a you know He's pursuing his happiness just like any one of us as individuals, but you as a manager when you go to work You are working for an owner For the purpose of producing and creating a profit and a Dagny is constantly fighting to make money She's constantly fighting to make money. Yes, but is that the only purpose? Of course not for who personally for none of us personally it is, but thank you. I rest my case Question please phrase your question as a question. Don't identify yourself. Don't make a speech lay the question on him Take it away. I believe I wish first why this is a question for for your own Biotechnology companies develop cancer drugs have an incentive to charge as much as possible Because the Medicare program is required by law to pay Subsidize the price of that drug for the consumer who pays nothing should pharmaceutical companies in order to maximize shareholder value Charge a billion dollars for a drug that normally might cost in a true market setting a hundred dollars They should fight to get rid of Medicare. That's what they should do In the meantime, what should they do is that is that with that advanced their shareholder profits to get rid of Medicare? Yes, I think it would clearly it would certainly if shareholders put aside if shareholders would benefit enormously If you privatize healthcare in spite of the fact that doctors shouldn't pursue profit if you privatized healthcare shareholders would benefit enormously absolutely But drug companies do and should Maximize their ability to generate profit from those drugs and they do they find the right balance Of course a billion dollars nobody can afford it Medicare wouldn't pay for it So they have to balance what can be paid what? Charity pays what what all the different elements pay they do maximize and they should maximize the profitability of that Even in the world in which we live today, which is dramatically screwed up John any comment on the question comment on the question you John Do you have a comment on that question and I think it's a great a great question because I think logically they should get as much As they can get even if it's harmful to their patients Even if it's something that people can't afford if they can get away with it They should get away with it. I think that's what he's his that's the logic of his argument in my opinion Question okay mark scousin So I'd like to ask John a question personal injury attorneys Do they are they seeking to really benefit the people or are they just selfish greedy People who are just trying to take advantage of the system and you see this also in many professions You see it in dentists who are aggressively saying oh you you have tooth decay. We have to give you a crown I got this all the time from dentists because that the profit margins were much higher Putting in a crown even though I didn't really need one or surgeons who are constantly pushing you to engage in surgery That's totally unnecessary to what what percent of Professionals are really it more interested in the money than really these idealistic Views that you have as the purpose of business. I have no idea what percentage of dentists and doctors and personal injury attorneys are corrupted by Focusing strictly on profits. I'd say to the degree they do they're unethical they're no longer true professionals because they are no longer fulfilling the The oath that they took when they became professionals. That's what I say to that But you know what you should find I tend to do business with people I trust and when I find a dentist or anybody else a lawyer that I think is is Primarily focused and taken as much money for me as possible. I Find another dentist mark. That's my advice to you. So people do do in fact There are there are bad actors in every profession mark. There are corrupt people everywhere Yeah, so let's you know the assumption I'm making here and maybe it should have been explicit about it Is that people acting ethically they're gonna be crooks if a dentist is lying to you He's lying to you and that's unethical and that's not acceptable behavior no matter what his motivation is So it's all within the context of people are not committing fraud, which is what which is the what you're describing There are lots of people committing fraud every day What I'm asking John is are there really in fact people that simply don't have these ideals that you're talking about They're just profit-oriented. They're not necessarily committing fraud, but they're just it's they're lying to you about the dentistry I just want to make money. That's all they want to do Of course, there are people like that There's a lot of people like that mark because we've had this message that the purpose of businesses to maximize profits for so long that People begin to act that way. That was Mark's cows in a freedom fest who runs freedom fest Probably because he doesn't just maximize profit. Thank you very much mark. Go ahead It seems to me that the differences sort of revolve around Altruism or egoism in the gray area surrounding them and I was kind of wondering how this would relate to a personal life Like what's my motive for being a husband a father? So I was wondering if either one of you could speak to Your ideas as applied to personal relationships like what is the main? Drive in in relationships. Is it to maximize my profits concerned with the people I love? Yeah, I'm happy to yeah, I mean I think it is to maximize obviously in personal relationship the issue is not profit It's it's it's happiness joy success And you interact with people this is this is what people get divorced because it's not working anymore You're not generating the relationship is not generating happiness and therefore there's a divorce But at the end of the day, I am a more legalist I believe that the way what you should be pursuing are your own values and your own happiness now It's easy to straw man the idea of egoism But that means you have deep meaningful relationship with other people because they have value to you because they Contribute to your happiness and your well-being. It's not I don't care about anybody to hell with everybody else You know, that's what he goes to me. No, he goes a means that I'm living for my own sake for my own happiness. What has happened is for quiet. It's like profit. What is profit required? Well, it's complicated, right? There's a lot of different factors and the way I integrate those factors around my life is How do all these things contribute to my happiness if I thought children were not going to contribute to my happiness? I wouldn't have them right the reason I had them is because I believe that they would contribute Thank you yarn your children and now John could you please respond to the question the answers? Obviously both We are complex Human beings are complex. We are both self-interested and We love We are both and we don't just love because it makes us happy to do it We will make sacrifices of our own interest We are complex and in my experience people that primarily Live for themselves are not as happy They're more narcissistic. They're more self-involved and they don't seem to care as much So I think we're both humans are complex and in my experience of life love is what gives life meaning and Yeah, I just want to do more of it question Yeah Most people here probably have read wealth of nations. I wonder how many have read theory of moral sentiment which Adam Smith thought was his more important book I Theory of moral sentiment talked about why we do things for other people and a lot of it boils down to Manners and wanting to Have self-respect. What is your question your question? Good. Yeah, so That feeds into a provocative observation. I didn't hear any contradictions between the two of you I think that what you were both saying was the same thing in very very different ways Emphasis on long-term profits means you're not going to be corrupt. You're not going to risk putting Customers at risk of death. You're not going to risk going to jail and I Think I understand your question sir Your question is to what extent do you feel you disagree with the Aaron? You aren't to what extent do you feel you disagree with John and Because this gentleman thinks you basically agree with each other. So go ahead. Yeah, how do you disagree with the Aaron? John I Just disagree that the only purpose of business is to maximize profits And that's the statement of the resolution and I disagree with that. Yeah, and how do you disagree with John? so I I just think that the approach of of Viewing all stakeholders somehow equal some kind kind of utilitarian function opens the door to To really really bad ideas Destroying American businesses. So I disagree with that focus and emphasize you like that Would we disagree about any particular business decision? I don't know probably not But maybe in some cases this is gonna have to be a final question Unfortunately, hopefully you'll be able to button all these guys afterwards We wanted an hour and a half session if you want to complain Mark is right back there Bring your complaints to mr. Scows and who's maximizing I know what he's max. I don't know what he's going. Yes. Go ahead Thank you guys very much for for doing this. I think how do each of you define purpose because it seems like you're on your Your definition is more of in the realm of function and then your definition is more in the realm of vision or calling And I don't think that those are mutually exclusive Purpose gun purpose anybody you want to take that? How do you find purpose? So purpose is is the integrating It's it's what your life integrates around if it's a personal purpose It's what your life integrates around and then the question is what is a business is what is what is the integrating factor the Factor that integrates all the decisions of a business towards what? That that that is what I think of purpose is a personal purpose is you know To me my moral purpose is my happiness everything integrates around that and I don't think it leads to narcissism and Love I think is the most selfish of all emotions. There's no emotion more selfish than love Yeah, yeah, I think we only have time for the summations John may you might be able to do your comment about that in your summation I hope unless you want to take a moment to discuss purpose go ahead Purpose is what our what we care most deeply about and it's what it's what calls us forward My own higher purpose is to help heal America. That's my own higher purpose and my life is dedicated to that proposition okay, thank you and We have four minutes for summations yarn do your summation four minutes take it away. Yeah, you're first your four minutes summation Okay, you're the positive. You're the affirmative. You go first this mission. Yeah, go any none of the focus, okay? You know one of the one of the one of the mistaken exceptions of profit is That it is about and I think this is in our culture. This is everywhere and it unfortunately even enters into John's discussion is this idea that profit is about Exploitation profit is about immorality profit is about fraud profit is about cock-cooking the books That's not profit That's the negation of profit suddenly long-term profit long-term wealth maximization Morality requires us to think long-term not just to focus on right now in life and in business and in every aspect and I completely agree with John that everything is interconnected absolutely and I used to run this exercise with my students You have to make this decision about closing the plant in Chicago and opening it in South Dakota make it worse Yep, you know opening a plant in Mexico And okay, let's list all the stakeholders on the board the 20 30 40 stakeholders that we can list and now let's make a decision Some stakeholders better off some stakeholders are worse off Some stakeholders ain't different some stakeholders half of them are you know some of them are pro this and some of them against it How do you make a decision? How do you wait them? Who do you wait more? Who do you wait less? How do you deal with the trade-offs that are necessary part of Running a complex enterprise any complex enterprise you have to have some principle by which to integrate them and In a business in a particularly in a publicly traded corporation that principle should be obvious What is going to maximize the benefit to the owners? You're their employee as a CEO as a management team. You're working for them How do you maximize the benefit for them? and That's maximizing long-term shareholder wealth and Again, you take all those issues all the 30 minutes two minutes Go ahead two minutes all the 30 stakeholders that are involved And now you've got a principle way which to decide what the trade-offs are going to be What is going to generate the long-term benefit to the owners of the business and That means some people are going to be better off some people we worse off But nobody can be treated so badly as they don't help you. They don't add to this purpose of Making money Now Making money is a beautiful thing It's about creating real values. It's about lifting your customers up It's about engaging in win-win relationships with everybody in your business with everybody In order to make life better Businesses that don't do that lose Businesses that don't do that go out of business one minute and There I'm sure businesses that started out with great Purposes that were not related to profit And they're not around anymore. We don't know we don't have them Because you know, it's called survivorship biased only the ones that survived around and the ones that survived Have to make decisions have to make trade-offs have to decide how to run the business And how to create value seconds and that value creation is measured the measure of value creation Is profit? How do we know Amazon has created immense value in the world because of how much Jeff Bezos is worth? That's how we know That they've changed our lives. Thank you all. Thank you Four minutes John take it away. I don't believe my debate opponent understands Stakeholders, I don't think he understands interdependency He mostly sees it sort of a Hobbesian trade-offs that these stakeholders at war with each other and that somehow or another you have to make profit your goal in order to sift it all through Business is complex when you run a large corporation like Whole Foods Market. It's highly complex There are a number of different variables and what I have found if you want to know what unites it It's not seeking profits. It's looking for when when when solutions Where all the stakeholders are simultaneously benefiting? When you look for trade-offs you find trade-offs when you look for synergies you find synergies He sees nothing but trade-offs whereas I see we can create business strategies that create values Simultaneously for our customers for our employees for our suppliers for our investors indeed for the larger community It's not easy to do. No, it's hard to do. It takes a great deal of creativity and imagination I can tell you I've been doing it successfully for 43 years now And so are most of the great corporations in America doing that now The world is changing the way it thinks about business. I Want you to consider the fact that capitalism and business are very much under attack and they're under attack primarily because We've been saying the purpose of business is to maximize profits Consider the fact that socialism has been tried 41 times in the last hundred years and it has failed 41 times You would think we would give up on that dream Why haven't we given up on it? Because we don't deliver the right message about what business is People see business is fundamentally concerned about maximizing profits that seems wrong to the average person And as a result we can't seem to kill socialism. It's like the zombie that he's coming back to life Now I think somebody like your own books is a very well-intentioned man I probably agree with him on about 98% as was pointed out By one of the audience members we agree about a lot But I think the idea that purpose is the only that profit is the only purpose of business is completely wrong And if it and when it's and when it's put out as an ethic Business is disliked and mistrusted. It doesn't motivate customers. It doesn't motivate employees It's not inspiring and it ultimately leads to short-term corruption thinking He can talk about the long-term all he wants to but most human beings don't function that way They start looking out for what is in their own best short-term self-interest And that's why we end up having those corruption and those scandals One minute one minute great Let me just end in with this wonderful quote by one of the greatest entrepreneurs of this time And that's Mark Binyoth the founder and CEO of Salesforce Truly great companies care about all of their stakeholders Employees customers partners shareholders in the communities where we live and work and the environment that sustains us The purpose of business is to make the world a better place 30 seconds Thanks for listening to me today. I wish for everyone here a life full of purpose and full of love Thank you very much Thank you to both our debaters And all of you I hope to see you in New York City this fall September October November We have debates. We're going back to New York City big time for our physical in-person debates Go into the soul forum.org for complete information. Thanks to John. Thanks to Yaren and thank you all