alt Hacker News>some people look at business as making money for the sake of making money. However other people look at making money as a means to better society.
if the two sides you describe agree on those definitions as mutually exclusive but in union describing the universal set of people, then they are both wrong.
as long as people engaged in a market make their own choices, then money is a direct measure of happiness on the margin. you give somebody your money in exchange for something you want and would rather have: this creates happiness out of thin air.
if you think a better society is a happier society, then going into business to make money is the same as going into business to make society better.
Replies
> as long as people engaged in a market make their own choices, then money is a direct measure of happiness on the margin
That is a big if which is straightforwardly false. This idea of market participants' choices being entirely free rests on the efficient market fallacy [0]. Whereas the reality is that even the structure of a market itself creates friction. One of the main points of business schools is learning how to recognize and take advantage of this structural friction, which business people then conveniently forget when it's time to assuage their own egos regarding their counterparties.
[0] which is basically in the realm of asserting P == NP. The supreme irony is that if the efficient market fallacy were true, then central planning would also work as well!
Society depends on long-term 'happiness'. Short-term 'happiness' often makes society worse.