Should a business's sole purpose be to generate a profit?

The most controversial statement about the role of business in the last fifty years, or some might say even the last century, came in an essay published in the New York Times in 1970, written Milton Friedman.

He argued that a business’s sole purpose was to generate profit. He also stated that companies that adopt “ responsible” attitudes are less competitive. In his 1970 article, Milton Friedman asked, “ What does it mean to say that the corporate executive has a ‘ social responsibility’ in his capacity as a businessman?” In his article, he concludes that: “ The difficulty of exercising ‘ social responsibility’ illustrates, of course, the great virtue of private competitive enterprise — it forces people to be responsible for their own actions and makes it difficult for them to ‘ exploit’ other people for either selfish or unselfish purposes. They can do good — but only at their own expense.” Of course, times have changed and we know better now. Ignoring environmental problems and social problems within society can lead to inferior business as compared with socially responsible counterparts.