Companies used to care about their customers. Companies used to care about their employees. Companies are in business to make profits for their stock holders. So Verizon and any other large corporation are in business to sell stock. Verizon is not in the communications business. They are not in business to sell cell phones or airtime. Don't get me wrong. That is how they increase the stock prices but don't kid yourself. It is all about the price of their stock.
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There have indeed been periods where corporations cared about employees more than they seem to now, but that has hardly always been the case. In the industrial revolution and the great robber-barons exploitation was far more popular.
Basically, when times were great economically, employers could be more generous. When global and local competition heats up, pensions are seen as a huge unfair economic burden and so the move away from defined benefit plans began.
But we do have pensions. It's called Social Security. We and the company pay into it equally all throughout our careers. We pay 7.65% of our earnings and the company pays 7.65%. Then at retirement we get a pension for the rest of our lives based on what we have contributed. And we get basic healthcare as well. So basically everyone who has worked a reasonable number of years is pretty much guaranteed at least a living pension. You won't get rich, but you won't starve,and if you are hungry there are plenty of government programs. Your 401(k) is on top of that and allows you a better standard of living based on your investment decisions over your career.
What has happened is that companies have realized that here they are paying for an expensive pension while the government is already providing a basic pension. So, they decided to create a scenario where their obligation is more defined (i.e., defined contribution) as opposed to the defined benefit pensions that include a lot of unknowns that drive companies and investors crazy.
You don't get it. Our country did grow and build many businesses without Shareholders. But then they changed. Corporations do not take care of their customers or their employees like they used to. Employees that worked 20, 30 or 40 years were provided pensions but now the corporations provide 401Ks which do not make as much as a pension does Especially when the economy takes a dump the pension does not drop in any way. But now it is more important to take care of the shareholder. Not to mention that executive's pay has grown percentage wise over their employees pay year over year. Since corporations give a large amount of this pay in stock options to entice the corporate executive to do more for the shareholders than the customers or employees. If the corporate executives cared about their employees they would make sure we all benefit by providing us with stock options. The all the employees would make more money together.
Let's not compare the US to China. China pays their workers almost nothing and has child labor that is disgusting. You should research that. I am a former Verizon employee who would have been laid off but I got out just in time. Verizon in comparison to China is all about the shareholders and the execs making their millions. Kind of like China. The government makes the money and the workers live on a dime.
its not that simple for corporations would not exist without customers to buy, workers to deliver, vendors to supply and country to provide law and order.
you take one element out of the equitation here, the whole thing crumbles.
the shareholder would want you to think they way you think, but it's much more complicated here - for example, china built an empire without shareholders, millions of companies, government owned - they are changing this a bit now but this tells you that you can arguably make it happen without shareholders - granted, the gov is the owner, but at the same time the gov wants to rule and extend the country, not only to make money.
there is a lot of research on this topic, would love to share more if you are interested.
and, sorry about my english, i am not a native speaker.