Quote - Companies that operate on a profit motive will generally do the "right thing", because failing to serve the customers decreases profit.

There's a very big caveat to that, and not a pretty one: the great majority of humans do the "right thing" out of fear of punishment, and if they can easily evade punishment - for example if they can make an inferior product at a higher profit with less work or quality without being caught, or if they can ignore expensive safety precautions without consequences - then they'll do it.  The current BP spill is a perfect example of this.  Sure, it's going to cost them money NOW, but before the spill I think it's pretty clear they didn't have any fear of consequences.

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