Social Responsiblity; J. Wiborg

Throughout all of the written his~ tory of the western world, men Mr. Wiborg is President of the Univar Cor poration. This is from his report to the Annual Meeting in Seattle, June 25, 1975. 746 have strived to obtain individual freedom and a right of each person to ownership of his own property and to the enjoyment thereof. In the middle ages the world suf fered from feudalism and serf dom but with the dawning of the industrial revolution and the con cepts of individual freedom intro duced in England and reaching their culmination in America, each man had the right to his own property and the rewards of his own effort. Freedom meant that no other man had a right to those rewards or to the sweat of another's brow. Slavery was abol ished but with the insidiousness of a plague, slavery began to re appear in the form of Marxism so that today we are told each of us is obligated, not through enlight ened self-interest and not through our own sense of consciousness 1975 SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY 747 but through Government mandate and taxation to give of our effort and our production and our capa bilities to others who will not make this effort. In the Commun ist countries the pendulum has swung fullfold to slavery.' .Free dom has been so instilled in the western nations that those who would bring slavery back have not dared to use force, but we are per mitting them to achieve the same result.

I think all of us must be con scious of our obligations to help those who are truly infirm, aged or incapable of providing for themselves. Beyond that, increas~ ing taxation eventually becomes slavery through depriving one man who is willing to work and produce through his own effort of the rewards of that effort by transferring a portion of these re wards to another who is not will ing to apply himself. Freedom of the individual re quires the right of self-initiative and of private ownership and the rewards that flow therefrom. It is incumbent upon all of us at every possible opportunity to speak of the glories and benefits of our free enterprise system rather than de fend its weaknesses. There will always be those who abuse as there have been in business, labor and government but no other sys tem has given so many people such a wonderful and prosperous way of life. Our company last year fully carried its social responsibilities and beyond, as did the people who worked so productively in it. We contributed sizeable amounts to chari ty. We paid enormous amounts of taxes. We built fine plants and maintained them well.

We created jobs through employ ment of capital and through in genuity of management. We pro vided employee benefits and improved them. Our people indi vidually gave of their time in their communities as well as through their own taxes earned by their prod ucti vity effort. What I am saying to you is that respon sible businesses are not only car rying their load of social respon sibility but beyond, and it is time to point the finger accusingly at those who want and expect to re~ ceive something in exchange for nothing, those who will not pro duce, although capable of doing so, and at governments who continue to burden the productive elements of our system 'with heavier and heavier loads until the golden wagon will surely break. ~ ONE of the most popular theories in economics is the belief in con spiracy: if you are not getting "your fair s'hare," it must be be cause somebody is plotting to take it away from you. Since the vast majority of the population almost daily feels the frustration of a budget constraint - not enough cash to spread among food, cloth ing, recreation, toys, taxes, and so forth - the superficial empirical evidence would seem more than plentiful to "prove" that the fat cats are ripping you off.