"Mmm. Well, yeah, but I'm not quite sure it's the same thing. Business certainly tries to paint itself in rosier colors than it deserves, but if you ask a businessman why he's in business, he'll usually tell you it's to make money. Very few businessmen will tell you they're in business because they want to create jobs; *that* would be a lie on the same order as the Unis' lie about Excelsior and Videbimus Lumen and so on."
Yup. I remember my first techie job at a startup in 1983. Management was all thused about creating a "company culture" because, clearly, that was the way to superexploit. They were visibly salivating at the thought. So we had all these meetings where we were supposed to determine what this culture would be...and distraught programmers were saying things like "culture... I don't know anything about culture....can I go back to programming now?" and others were (incredulously) saying "you mean if you have a choice between making money and honoring our cultural values, you'll go for the values?????" And all the grunts were hoping management could not be so stupid as to believe their own bullshit, and everybody was mildly resentful of the fact that we had to pretend to believe the bullshit AND take time out from work to pretend to believe the bullshit. Really, it was extremely funny. (I keep telling my kids that "The Office" is one of the most realistic shows on TV.)
Company burned through 30 million and then went under.
Joanna