Peter Drucker, widely regarded as the father of modern management, viewed corporate profit not as an end in itself but as a condition for survival. Profit, in his view, was not a reward for capitalist greed but the minimum cost a company must secure to bear future risks and invest in research and development (R&D) and innovation. A company must generate profit to survive, and only by surviving can it deliver better products to customers, provide jobs for employees, and fulfill its social responsibilities.
Drucker was also critical of the "shareholder value maximization" doctrine that rose to prominence in U.S. management circles in the 1980s. He argued that prioritizing shareholder interests alone could trap companies in short-term financial metrics rather than customer satisfaction or the intrinsic value of their products. Instead, he believed that the interests of stakeholders surrounding a company — shareholders, customers, employees, local communities, and suppliers — must be balanced.
In Korea, this perspective is often invoked when workers demand "our fair share." The recent demand by Samsung Electronics' (005930.KS) Super Enterprise Union that 15% of operating profit be allocated as a performance bonus pool reflects this line of thinking. The argument is that workers played a role in generating corporate profits and should therefore share in the results. Given that the competitiveness of a world-class semiconductor company rests on the labor of employees who accumulated technology and manufactured products on the factory floor, the claim itself cannot be dismissed outright.
Public sentiment, however, has been cold. In a Realmeter survey, 69.3% of respondents said the Samsung Electronics strike was "an excessive demand that risks weakening industrial competitiveness and is therefore inappropriate." Only 18.5% called it "a legitimate exercise of rights." This should not be seen merely as envy toward highly paid employees of a major corporation. What troubles the public is not the bonus itself but the appearance that a particular group is seeking to take an outsized share of the fruits of the semiconductor boom.
Samsung Electronics' profits are not the result of current employees' efforts alone. They reflect investment decisions made by past generations of employees, tens of trillions of won in facility investment, the supply chains of partner companies, capital from minority shareholders, investment from the National Pension Service (NPS), government tax support and infrastructure, global artificial intelligence (AI) demand, and rising memory prices. Even in 2023, when Samsung Electronics' DS division posted an annual loss of nearly 15 trillion won, the government helped prevent a decline in semiconductor competitiveness through tax benefits and infrastructure support for factory construction.
Shareholders are not the sole owners of a company. But the reverse — that workers alone are the owners — is equally untrue. Michael Jensen, professor emeritus at Harvard University, argued that when the demands of various stakeholders clash, the criterion for judgment should be long-term value. Employee compensation, shareholder distributions, cooperation with partner companies, R&D investment, and cash reserves for downturns are all legitimate demands. The question is, when those demands collide, which choice best enhances a company's growth and competitiveness.
This principle is all the more important in the semiconductor industry, which requires massive facility investment. This year's profits are both next year's bonus pool and the investment resources needed for the next generation of processes, high-bandwidth memory (HBM), and foundry competition. For a semiconductor company, profit is less a trophy of the present than a cost of the future. As the scale of investment needed to secure future competitiveness continues to grow, treating profits as merely something to be distributed immediately will inevitably weaken the foundation of corporate survival.
This does not mean employees' contributions should go unrewarded. To retain world-class talent, compensation systems must be more transparent and bolder. But such rewards must be designed within a framework that also considers future investment, the partner ecosystem, and the stakes of shareholders and the national economy. Sharing the rewards and protecting future competitiveness must not be pitted against each other.
Samsung Electronics' Super Enterprise Union and management have agreed to return to the bargaining table, with a planned general strike just over 10 days away. It is right that the fruits of a company's achievements be shared. But future competitiveness must not be pulled forward and divided up in advance. The profit Drucker described was not a share for someone to claim first but a condition for the company to survive another day. If the union's demands fail to account for this balance, they risk being seen as those of an interest group indifferent to the company's future. Given how hard-won these negotiations are, one can only hope for a resolution that the public finds reasonable.
