NationStates Jolt Archive

i have recently submitted a proposal to the UN. It is called the Records Publication Resolution . I submitted this proposal with the intent of protectign investors from greedy businesses that do not think about their investor welfare. What do you guys think of this proposal?

here is the text of the proposal as it is shown on the UN proposals page of Nation states:

Records Publication Resolution

A resolution to reduce income inequality and increase basic welfare.
*
Category: Social Justice
Strength: Significant
Proposed by: Cramzpatio

Description:
RECOGNIZING that:
A. Corporate entities wield considerable power over investors welfare and income.
B. These same corporate entities regularly keep their budgets and spending secrect.
C. They can frequently publish false records to mislead investors.
D. This policy has a detrimental effect on both the welfare of individual investors, as well as the trust that citizens place in their nations economies and governments.

RESOLVES that:
A. To prevent fraud of corporate records companies will be required to release honest and well detailed documents pertaining to their expenditures and returns.
B. The U.N. will create an organization to investigate and prosecute individuals guilty of violating this resolution, Comittee on Corporate Honesty (C.C.H.)

TO enforce this measure the U.N. organization, C.C.H., will enforce a $1 million dollar fine on any corporations found in violation of this act.

This act will help to cut down on corporate dishonesty and secure the welfare of millions of investors around the world.


Thanks for your input guys

I could not support such a resolution.

Law enforcement issues such as the one this resolution tries to address should be left to the internal legal systems of member states. Plus, it would be impossible for a single UN committee to uniformly police all thirty-something thousand members’ corporations, if not simply due to sheer mass concerned, then because what is legal in one nation may well be completely different in another. We have nations in the UN that completely outlaw private enterprise, as well as nations that are private enterprises. Not only that, but because the UN lacks the ability to raise any semblance of an army or international police, actually enforcing the laws would be quite difficult.

And really, one million dollars as a flat penalty? How do you expect a company whose total net worth is less than ten million dollars to pay such a fine? And what about massive corporations that eat a million bucks with their Wheaties? That section of the resolution alone is enough reason to vote it down.

Of course, with the volume of paperwork involved, the woodchipping industry would absolutely love a resolution like this.

Recommending changes..... mostly punctuation and spelling... (changes in red)


Records Publication Resolution

A resolution to reduce income inequality and increase basic welfare.
*
Category: Social Justice
Strength: Significant
Proposed by: Cramzpatio

Description:
RECOGNIZING that:
A. Corporate entities wield considerable power over investors welfare and income.
B. These same corporate entities regularly keep their budgets and spending secret.
C. They can frequently publish false records to mislead investors.
D. This policy has a detrimental effect on both the welfare of individual investors, as well as the trust that citizens place in their nation's economy and government.

RESOLVES that:
A. To prevent fraud within company's corporate records, companies will be required to release honest and well detailed documents pertaining to their expenditures and returns.
B. The U.N. will create an organization to investigate and prosecute individuals guilty of violating this resolution, Comittee on Corporate Honesty (C.C.H.)

TO enforce this measure the U.N. organization, C.C.H., will enforce a $1 million dollar fine on any corporations found in violation of this act. (Not sure if a blanket fine should be imposed.... Such seems highly inequitable.... Maybe, instead a percentile fine, or a fine based upon damages to the investors?)

This act will help to cut down on corporate dishonesty and secure the welfare of millions of investors around the world.


Thanks for your input guys

Ok, thank you for your feed back. If this organization could not impose a blanket fine what measures do you think could be taken to force companies to comply with this proposal?

If that is all the feedback that people have i will make a revised draft in the near future.

Thank you all.

I haven't studying the proposal with any thoroughness, but I think there's a case for this being a Free Trade proposal, rather than a Social Justice proposal.

Besides that, First, I also don't like the corporate fine. Second, you need to make certain this only applies to publicly traded companies, as privately owned companies have a whole different situation with publishing documents.

And, quite frankly I'm not sure this is the pervue of the UN except in the case of extremely large, multinational corporations. If PC industries is falsifying income, I think its my nation's government that would be most apt at prosecuting and invesgitating it, and at overseeing corporations which are pretty much just within my nation.

I'd better spell out the case for "Free Trade".

A Free Trade proposal is simply one that reduces barriers to trade. If you add a clause arguing that "corporate fraudulance and misinformation is a barrier to free and fair trade", it would seem to fit well into Free Trade.

Further, Social Justice largely has to do with how wealth is distributed, and I don't see how that fits too well with this proposal.

Ok, thank you for your feed back. If this organization could not impose a blanket fine what measures do you think could be taken to force companies to comply with this proposal?

If that is all the feedback that people have i will make a revised draft in the near future.

Thank you all.

MAke the fine a percentile, or a recoup of damages suffered by the investors...

A blanket fine is just not doing much; $1,000,000 may seem like alot; but take these two examples: Bob's Hot-Dog stand, and Microsoft...

A $1,000,000 fine would crush Bob's..... But to MS it would be chump change... If it were percentile, or based upon damages, it would be far more equitable; as opposed to a blanket fine, which would crush little-guys; while BigBusiness could run ramshackle over the multi-billion dollar investments they hold, and pay out penny-ante fines for it... If it's going to act to dissuade the practice, it needs to ensure that the penalty is proportionally imposed, regardless of the corporate income of the one violating...

The good people of Discordinia do not believe the NSUN should micro-manage or otherwise regulate the affairs of private companies.

The repurcussions for coporate malfeasance should be left to the civil and/or criminal laws of individual nations.

All Hail Eris!

-Cookie I, El Jefe

It's a good idea for an issue, but less suitable for UN purposes.

i have recently submitted a proposal to the UN. It is called the Records Publication Resolution . I submitted this proposal with the intent of protectign investors from greedy businesses that do not think about their investor welfare. What do you guys think of this proposal?

here is the text of the proposal as it is shown on the UN proposals page of Nation states:

Records Publication Resolution

A resolution to reduce income inequality and increase basic welfare.
*
Category: Social Justice
Strength: Significant
Proposed by: Cramzpatio

Description:
RECOGNIZING that:
A. Corporate entities wield considerable power over investors welfare and income.
B. These same corporate entities regularly keep their budgets and spending secrect.
C. They can frequently publish false records to mislead investors.
D. This policy has a detrimental effect on both the welfare of individual investors, as well as the trust that citizens place in their nations economies and governments.

RESOLVES that:
A. To prevent fraud of corporate records companies will be required to release honest and well detailed documents pertaining to their expenditures and returns.
B. The U.N. will create an organization to investigate and prosecute individuals guilty of violating this resolution, Comittee on Corporate Honesty (C.C.H.)

TO enforce this measure the U.N. organization, C.C.H., will enforce a $1 million dollar fine on any corporations found in violation of this act.

This act will help to cut down on corporate dishonesty and secure the welfare of millions of investors around the world.


Thanks for your input guys

We are broadly supportive of the principles of this act, particularly point A and agree with the statements pertaining to the negative effects of corporate dishonesty with regards to accounting. We cannot support the proposal however, because we are in disagreement with point B and the measures against the corporation are too harsh.

A single committee to oversee all investigations of corporate malfaesance and mispractice would be ineffective and unwieldy. Instead I would suggest that point B read:

The U.N. will create a committee to oversee the work of regional blocs, i.e. International Democratic Union, NationStates, etc; who shall each have a Comittee on Corporate Honesty to examine all business accounts practices. The C.C.H shall file regular reports to the central U.N. C.C.H who will have the final say over any action undertaken against a company. The C.C.H of the U.N. shall also be responsible for publishing a code of conduct each year for all companies in the Nation States Game.

Equally, a flat fine of one-million dollars is both illogical (few nations use dollars and our currency, the strachan, is so strong that the exchange rate is 1 per 4000 dollars). And it is either too little (big companies will shrug off such a small fine) or too hard (if the company is small and vulnerable).

For these reasons, we cannot support this proposal at present.

May the blessings of our otters be upon you.

Leonard Otterby
Ambassador for the Republic of Compadria to the U.N.

well, it seems like the thing that people have the most problems with is the punishment system. Im debating how to resolve that. Should i make it a percentage, or leave it up to the nations and merely say that nations who do not enforce this measure will have sanctions placed upon them?

Thanks for your input.