Don’t blame China! How Greedy Wall Street destroyed American Industries and America in the process. By Johnson Choi in San Francisco on January 24 2026 別怪中國！貪婪的華爾街如何摧毀了美國工業，以及在此過程中摧毀美國. 作者: 蔡永強. 2026年1月24日

Let’s gets to the heart of a major shift in American capitalism over the last 40+ years. Let’s expand on that discussion by breaking down the legal changes, the philosophy behind them, and the cascading effects.

1. The Legal Change: How Stock Buybacks Were “Unshackled”

The key change was not about making buybacks legal (they always were), but about making them safe, easy, and incentivized for executives without fear of prosecution.

· Pre-1982: The “Stock Manipulation” Fear: Before 1982, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) treated large-scale repurchases of a company’s own stock with deep suspicion. The concern was that they could be used to manipulate the market, artificially inflating the stock price to deceive investors. Companies could do them, but the legal risk was high.
· The Watershed Moment: SEC Rule 10b-18 (1982): Under the Reagan administration, the SEC adopted Rule 10b-18. This rule created a “safe harbor.” If a company followed certain rules (on volume, timing, and manner of purchases), it would be presumed not to be illegally manipulating its stock price. This wasn’t a mandate, but a green light. It removed the legal risk and opened the floodgates.
· The Incentive Shift: Linking Pay to Stock Price (1990s): A more profound change was in tax policy and compensation rules. In 1993, the Clinton administration passed a law that capped the corporate tax deduction for executive salaries at $1 million. However, it created a massive loophole: performance-based pay, like stock options, was exempt from the cap. Overnight, the incentive structure for CEOs was radically altered. Their personal wealth became directly tied to the short-term stock price, not the long-term health of the company.

The Result: The combination of safe buybacks and compensation tied to stock price created a powerful, self-rewarding mechanism. A CEO could use company profits (or even debt) to buy back shares, reducing the number of shares outstanding, which boosts Earnings Per Share (EPS) and often the stock price. Their options and stock holdings then soar in value.

2. How This Connected to Offshoring and Industry Erosion

This new financial engineering tool didn’t exist in a vacuum. It interacted with global trends and a new corporate philosophy.

· The Rise of “Shareholder Primacy”: In the 1970s-80s, the Milton Friedman doctrine that a company’s sole responsibility is to maximize shareholder value took hold. This meant that investing in workers, communities, or long-term R&D was seen as a waste of shareholder money if it didn’t provide an immediate return.
· The Short-Termism Engine:

1. Capital Allocation Choice: A company now had a clear choice: take its profits and a) reinvest in new factories, R&D, and worker training in the U.S. (risky, long-term, low immediate return), or b) buy back stock (guaranteed to boost EPS and the stock price).
2. Offshoring as a Double Win: Moving production overseas was a powerful way to generate the cash for more buybacks. It cut costs dramatically (cheaper labor, fewer regulations). These “savings” were often not passed to consumers or workers, but were funneled directly to shareholders and executives via buybacks and dividends.
3. The Cycle: Buybacks starved domestic industrial capacity of investment. Older U.S. factories became less competitive, which was used to justify more offshoring. The financialized company became a cash-extraction machine rather than a production-innovation engine.
4. The Outcome: The Destruction of Industrial Capacity

This wasn’t just about greed in a moral sense; it was a systemic re-engineering of priorities:

· Erosion of the Productive Base: Critical industries like semiconductors, steel, machine tools, and consumer electronics atrophied. The “knowledge” of how to manufacture at scale was lost.
· The Weakening of Labor: With the threat of offshoring ever-present, unions lost power. Wages for the working and middle class stagnated, while executive pay skyrocketed. The link between productivity gains and pay was broken.
· Increased Systemic Risk: Companies took on huge debt to fund buybacks even in good times, making them fragile during downturns (e.g., the COVID-19 crisis).
· Wealth Inequality Explosion: The vast majority of stock is owned by the wealthiest 10%. Buybacks directly transfer wealth from company coffers (which could benefit all stakeholders) to the already wealthy. The CEO-worker pay ratio went from ~20-to-1 in the 1960s to over 300-to-1 today.

In Summary:

The law (Rule 10b-18) didn’t create buybacks but made them a risk-free tool. The tax code change incentivized executives to prioritize stock price above all else. This converged with the ideology of shareholder primacy and the global opportunity of offshoring.

The result was a vicious cycle: Use offshoring to cut costs → Use profits for buybacks to boost stock price → Collect massive stock-based bonuses → Underinvest in domestic innovation and workforce → Become less competitive → Repeat.

The “destruction of US industries” was not an accidental byproduct; it was the logical outcome of a system that rewarded financial engineering over industrial engineering, and short-term stock gains over long-term productive capacity.

讓我們深入探討過去四十多年來美國資本主義的一次重大轉變。我們將透過剖析法律變更、背後的哲學思想及其所產生的連鎖效應，來擴展這場討論。

1. 法律變更：股票回購如何被「鬆綁」

關鍵的變更並非在於讓回購變得合法（它們一直是合法的），而是在於讓企業高管能夠安全、輕易地進行回購，並從中獲利，而無需擔心被起訴。

· 1982 年之前：對「股價操縱」的恐懼：在 1982 年之前，美國證券交易委員會（SEC）對企業大規模回購自身股票的行為深表懷疑。擔憂在於，此舉可能被用來操縱市場，人為抬高股價以欺騙投資者。公司可以這麼做，但法律風險很高。
· 分水嶺時刻：SEC 規則 10b-18（1982 年）：在雷根政府時期，SEC 通過了 規則 10b-18。該規則創造了一個「安全港」。如果公司遵循特定規則（關於回購數量、時機和方式），將被推定為沒有非法操縱其股價。這不是強制命令，而是一盞綠燈。它消除了法律風險，打開了閘門。
· 激勵機制的轉變：將薪酬與股價掛鉤（1990 年代）：更深刻的變化來自稅收政策和薪酬規則。1993 年，柯林頓政府通過了一項法律，將企業高層薪資的稅務抵扣上限設為 100 萬美元。然而，它創造了一個巨大的漏洞：績效薪酬，如股票期權，不受此上限限制。一夜之間，企業高層的激勵結構發生了根本性改變。他們的個人財富變得與短期股價直接掛鉤，而非公司的長期健康。

結果：安全的回購機制與和股價掛鉤的薪酬制度相結合，創造了一種強大的自我獎勵機制。企業高層可以利用公司利潤（甚至舉債）回購股票，減少流通股數量，從而提升每股盈餘（EPS）並經常推高股價。他們的期權和持股價值隨之飆升。

2. 這如何與海外外包和產業侵蝕聯繫起來

這種新的金融工程工具並非憑空存在。它與全球趨勢和新的企業哲學相互作用。

· 「股東至上主義」的興起：1970 至 80 年代，米爾頓·傅利曼的學說——即公司的唯一責任是最大化股東價值——開始占據主導地位。這意味著，對員工、社區或長期研發的投資，若不能帶來立即回報，就會被視為浪費股東資金。
· 短期主義引擎：

1. 資本配置選擇：公司現在面臨一個明確的選擇：將其利潤用於 a) 在美國重新投資於新工廠、研發和員工培訓（風險高、長期、即時回報低），或者 b) 回購股票（保證能提升 EPS 和股價）。
2. 海外外包的雙贏：將生產轉移到海外，是為更多回購產生現金的強有力方式。它能大幅削減成本（更便宜的勞動力、更少的法規）。這些「節省下來的成本」通常並未傳遞給消費者或員工，而是透過回購和股息直接輸送給了股東和高層。
3. 惡性循環：回購剝奪了國內工業產能的投資。美國的老舊工廠變得越來越缺乏競爭力，而這又被用來證明更多海外外包的合理性。金融化的公司變成了現金提款機，而非生產創新引擎。
4. 後果：工業產能的毀滅

這不僅僅是道德層面的貪婪問題；它是一場對優先次序的系統性重構：

· 生產基礎的侵蝕：半導體、鋼鐵、機床和消費電子等關鍵產業萎縮了。大規模製造的「知識」流失了。
· 勞工力量的削弱：隨著海外外包的威脅始終存在，工會失去了權力。工人和中產階級的薪資停滯不前，而高管薪酬卻飆升。生產力增長與薪酬之間的連結被切斷了。
· 系統性風險增加：公司即使在景氣時期也背負巨額債務來進行回購，使它們在經濟下行時期變得脆弱（例如 COVID-19 危機）。
· 財富不平等爆炸性增長：絕大多數股票由最富有的 10% 的人持有。回購直接將財富從公司金庫（本可使所有利益相關者受益）轉移給已經富裕的人。企業高層與普通員工的薪酬比率從 1960 年代的約 20:1 上升到今天的超過 300:1。

總結：

法律（規則 10b-18）並未創造回購，但使其成為一種無風險的工具。稅法的變更激勵企業高層將股價置於一切之上。這與股東至上的意識形態以及海外外包的全球機會匯聚在一起。

結果形成了一個惡性循環：利用海外外包削減成本 → 利用利潤進行回購以推高股價 → 獲取巨額股票獎勵 → 對國內創新和勞動力投資不足 → 競爭力下降 → 重複循環。

「美國工業的毀滅」並非意外的副產品；它是一個獎勵金融工程勝過工業工程、獎勵短期股票收益勝過長期生產能力的系統，所必然產生的邏輯結果。