The sheep in "Animal Farm" repeat the slogan, "Four legs good, two legs bad". In the management world these days, the chant is "Long-termism good, short-termism bad". The Harvard Business Review constantly thunders against the evils of short-termism. Bosses of listed companies give off-the-record briefings to journalists bemoaning shareholders' inability to see beyond the ends of their noses. In the continental European model of capitalism, long-termism means that businesses will prosper by pursuing the enduring interests of all their "stakeholders", workers and suppliers included. More recently, supporters of Anglo-Saxon capitalism have produced a variant of this argument: firms will enjoy sustained growth if they favour the interests of long-term shareholders over traders who hold stock for briefer periods.
展开▼
