The business of America …

Description

The Business of America ... is the first film to probe one of our most treasured economic assumptions: that private corporations can be trusted to make the investments upon which all Americans depend. The film contrasts two Pittsburgh steelworkers conventional faith in private enterprise with the actual strategies and priorities of a giant corporation, U.S. Steel. It traces their growing realization that despite "supply side" business claims, increased profits don't necessarily "trickle down" to working Americans. To discover why, The Business of America ... interviews U.S. Steel chairman David Roderick, travels to Wall Street and visits Harvard Business School. The film reveals that shareholder pressures to increase profitability have led many American firms to transform themselves from manufacturing enterprises into financial conglomerates. It raises troubling questions about whether the prevailing emphasis on short-term profits provides for the long-term investments industries -- and the country -- need to provide economic opportunities to all Americans.The urgency of these concerns has made The Business of America ... a standard audiovisual "text" in many economics, sociology, management, labor studies, and business ethics courses as well as a prescient warning of the ruin left behind when a nation allows corporations the unabated freedom to pursue profits any way they can.

Runtime

58 minutes

Subjects

Contributor

Geography

Genre

Database

Alexander Street

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