A recent thread that turned into a car debate got me thinking about the buying decision when considering the company as a factor.

With Cars I do not buy a Ford - not because a specific car may not be good or the company is getting better but by what I call seriously questionable history of and very poor corporate citizen. Since you can't go after a corporation and no individual can be held accountable for their actions all I have left is voting with my dollar. From Henry ford donating to the cause to put Jews in Gas chambers, to pressuring governments not to improve emission standards with the threat of lawsuits, to selling cars they know would kill people but elected to not fix the problem because letting people die and paying off lawsuits was better for the bottom line - and after all ALL corporations first goal is the shareholder - all other considerations are legally secondary to the generation of profit. But few seem to make the decisions so easily. And then the tires, the cop killer vehicles the class action suits on other vehicles. Enough is enough IMO - there is competition that makes just as good if not better cars that don't have those kinds of track records. So I elect to make the choice for something else.

With audio and the built it in slave labour countries where corporations can skirt unions and labour laws I have some difficulty with those. Although to be fair some of these companies do a better job with their treatment of employees. I have less of a problem with a Chinese company selling Chinese gear using Chinese labour and following their laws than I have with European or American companies that deliberately dump their own workforce to build in places like China merely to skirt labour and pollution controls.

I am wondering if others look into such things before they make a purchase.