The legendary Chicago economist, Milton Friedman, was not somebody to do anything by halves. Where others before him had shied away from even thinking aloud about the limits of firms’ responsibilities to those around them, Friedman waded into the debate with both feet. Corporations can serve society best, he stated, by cutting their costs to the bone and accordingly by making as much profit as possible. This argument did not reference competitiveness directly in its original articulation, but it acts as an important forerunner of modern-day competitiveness discourse. Corporations that deny their broader social responsibilities, Friedman argued, set themselves on the road to a truly competitive zero rate of taxation.

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