It Takes A Village, by Hillary Clinton: on Corporations

Family-friendly work policies are good for business

The Du Pont Company was one of the first large companies to institute work-family programs such as job sharing and subsidized emergency child care. A study of employees confirmed the view that family-friendly policies are a good business practice.

On October 31, 1995, I hosted an event at the White House honoring 21 companies in the American Business Collaboration for Quality Dependent Care that have pledged to contribute $100 million for child and dependent care in 56 cities. All the companies participating believe in our theme: ‘Doing together what none of us can afford to do alone.’

Businesses play social role in US; gov’t oversight required

Other developed countries, like Japan & Germany, are more committed to social stability than we have been, and they tailor their economic policie to maintain it. We have chosen a different path, leaving more of our resources in the private sector.

As a society, we have a choice to make. We can permit the marketplace largely to determine the values & well-being of the village, or we can continue, as we have in the past, to expect business to play a social as well as an economic role. That means we have to look realistically at what government must require business to do, principally in the areas of health, safety, the environment [and so on].