# Examples of financially successful Liberal businessmen and entrepreneurs **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 31, 2009, 3:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/examples-of-financially-successful-liberal-businessmen-and-entrepreneurs/491393 "2009-03-31T03:13:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2009, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/examples-of-financially-successful-liberal-businessmen-and-entrepreneurs/491393/41 "2009-04-01T17:57:10Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > I don’t really understand this sentence or your point in general, however I am sure you can find plenty of liberal politicians, lawyers and filmmakers. > > I’m not really interested in Bloomberg the politician, I’m more interested in Bloomberg the businessman. What I am really looking for are businessmen and entrepreneurs who created companies who demonstrated liberal tendencies while creating their business… Well the question is muddled by the issue of what mean by “liberal” or “conservative.” You say “fiscally conservative” and prompted you quote a definition that includes criteria of federal deficit, spending, taxation, etc. But you have not been able to offer up any clear examples of individuals who you personally believe represent the fiscal conservative POV let alone the “fiscally liberal” POV that you want Big Business examples of. And now you say that you don’t want people’s political POV or specific thoughts regarding federal management but who “who demonstrated liberal tendencies while creating their business[es]” … whatever that means. I do not mean to be snarky here but it is not at all clear what you are really asking or why and if you cannot offer up any specific examples for us to use as prototypical fiscal liberals and fiscal conservatives then one can only conclude that you yourself do not what question you are asking either. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2009, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/examples-of-financially-successful-liberal-businessmen-and-entrepreneurs/491393/42 "2009-04-01T19:40:47Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > Henry Ford was extremely politically conservative. Being good to your employees doesn’t make you liberal. Hmmm…I see that he was awarded the Grand Cross of the German Eagle by the Nazis. That’s pretty far to the right. Then again, the Soviet Union embraced “Fordism” and that’s pretty far to the left. > [@DSeid](#): > > I do not mean to be snarky here but it is not at all clear what you are really asking or why and if you cannot offer up any specific examples for us to use as prototypical fiscal liberals and fiscal conservatives then one can only conclude that you yourself do not what question you are asking either. hmm…Perhaps I don’t. I’ll try to think on it some more and see if I can clarify. Maybe a better question would be how does the political beliefs of those businessmen who people have identified as Liberal (or Conservative for that matter) manifest itself in the way they run their business (other than philanthropies). Is there a Liberal way to run a business that is different from the Conservative way of running that same business? ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2009, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/examples-of-financially-successful-liberal-businessmen-and-entrepreneurs/491393/43 "2009-04-01T19:48:13Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > Henry Ford was extremely politically conservative. Being good to your employees doesn’t make you liberal. Henry Ford can’t be neatly described as conservative or liberal. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2009, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/examples-of-financially-successful-liberal-businessmen-and-entrepreneurs/491393/44 "2009-04-01T20:13:21Z")
Yep. Ford was pretty radical for his time in providing jobs to blacks on the same basis and with the same pay as whites. He was also as cholerically anti-Semitic as any American has ever been (Hitler wrote glowingly of him in Mein Kampf). His “Five Dollars a Day” wage was shockingly liberal for its time, too - but he arrived at it on the business calculation of reducing turnover costs. He built decent housing for company employees, but oversaw his tenant-employees’ lives pretty paternalistically. So take your pick. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2009, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/examples-of-financially-successful-liberal-businessmen-and-entrepreneurs/491393/45 "2009-04-01T20:14:40Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > Then again, the Soviet Union embraced “Fordism” and that’s pretty far to the left. You could describe the glorification of man-as-machine working on production lines as tyrannically fascist, too. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2009, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/examples-of-financially-successful-liberal-businessmen-and-entrepreneurs/491393/46 "2009-04-01T20:49:55Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > Henry Ford can’t be neatly described as conservative or liberal. He was a strong opponent of the New Deal and a supporter of Senator Vandenberg. I think that some people are falling into the assumption that **msmith** is trying to find out…that there’s a “conservative” and a “liberal” way to run a business. Saying “So-and-so treats his employees really well, so therefore he’s liberal.”…I don’t know that’s a safe assumption to make. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/examples-of-financially-successful-liberal-businessmen-and-entrepreneurs/491393.md?page=2)