Good morning.
I take strong exception to a common phrase that keeps coming up: "giving back to society."
This language is misleading and harmful. It implies that when you made the profit, you somehow took something from society.
Business, properly and ethically conducted, is the opposite of taking. Business creates value. It provides goods, services, jobs, and solutions that people freely choose to purchase. And yet even giants like Starbucks, which provide solid wages and healthcare to 1,000s of employees, still broadcast guilt for their success by touting their charitable work as “giving back to society”. Small wonder many young folks believe business to be immoral, with calls for wealth redistribution and joint ownership of businesses.
If making money is legitimate value creation, then what is there to "give back? Is Charity some twisted penance for having succeeded?
NO. Charity is a separate, good & moral act.
Framing charity as "giving back" treats business like a form of piracy or sin that must later be cleansed & forgiven by donations or papal indulgences.
The "giving back" view undermines the dignity of ethical commerce.
Business owners should give because it is right, rather than because they need to buy social respectability. When we accept the language of "giving back," we quietly accept the idea that earning profit was somehow questionable or immoral.
I reject that idea completely.
For this group, the practical takeaway is simple: give, and do so from a position of pride in the value your business creates, rather than from a sense of debt, shame, or sin about the profit or value you created.
Thank you.