“You are arguing that the government should force Google to give money to a non-profit political entity whose views you happen to agree with.”
No. The opposite. The government should prevent them from giving other people’s money to entities that are not directly correlated to the company mission. CEOs and corporate board members should not be able to treat company equity as their personal property. They should not be able to dip into company revenues to extract money to give to their political allies or other buddies.
“What is the difference between a ‘public’ company and a private company?”
A public company has owner shares that are publicly traded on the stock market. A private company is owned by individuals through private agreements. The purpose for forming a corporation or LLC that is privately held is to shield personal assets from liability. This means a person or group of people can start a business for profit, and if that business ends up having liabilities (say for example a person is injured by an employee of the company) then only the company is liable. The injured parties can not recover damages from the owners of the company beyond what assets the company has. There are exceptions when an owner can become personally liable. In a legal scenario, this is called “piercing the veil.”
However, when such a privately held company “goes public” they issue shares in an IPO (initial public offering) and the company begins to be traded on a stock exchange. Any member of the public can buy shares and become a part-owner of a publicly traded company. If you own more than 50%, you have controlling interest. Sometimes public companies are “taken private,” meaning the company is converted to private ownership and stops being traded on a stock exchange.
Such exchanges are a cornerstone of free enterprise “markets.” They are places to buy and sell companies in small pieces called “shares.” This allows companies to have access to capital needed to run a large business. It allows investors (average folk) to save for retirement or otherwise store wealth in a profitable, capitalistic manner without having to become business experts in competitive and lucrative industries. Everyone has the opportunity to gain in this system. But there is also plenty of opportunity for corruption, fraud, and theft.
The CEO and President and board members of Google do own company stock. So they are owners. They do not own 100% though. The shares are owned by anyone who buys them on the stock market. This includes a lot of your average citizens who have a retirement account that includes shares of stock in Google.
A for-profit company that is publicly traded exists to provide a product or service that generates a profit for its investors. When a CEO or other key leaders in a company take actions that financially damage the owners, it can be criminal because they have a “fiduciary responsibility” to act in the best interest of the share holders.
Therefore, giving away money that does not belong to them should be treated as illegal and even criminal. Any such disbursement of funds should require a vote by the share holders who actually own the company.
Charitable and political giving by publicly held corporations should be regulated. Would you be ok if your bank randomly extracted a few dollars every once in a while from your bank account to give to a charity, political action committee, or politician? Why should corporate executives be able to do so? They make plenty of money. They should give their own money rather than the public’s.
What are you talking about? This entire thread is about Google demonetizing certain videos because of what is in their view objectionable content.
You seem to have lost the point of this post entirely.