It is normal for people to work for other people or companies. Some you will like; some you will love and others you are looking for another opportunity. Overtime, the ones you love, you begin to believe that the company has your back to. Whether it does, is a different issue, but for now it is important that people will have a relationship with company and they bleed the company’s color.

A book titled Exposure written by Robert Bilott published by Atria Books, An Imprint of Simon & Schuster, NY, 2019 asks what if the company does not have your back?

In the book, Dupont based in Delaware opened up a number of plants to manufacture products from their chemicals. One of the chemicals became well known as Teflon and many homes across the US and around the world had no stick Teflon pans and used them on a regular basis and were happy with the product. At the plant, the chemical that made the Teflon is PFOA and related PFAS, these are chemicals that do a great job, but do not break down in the environment or are called forever chemicals. At every manufacturing company, something has to be done with the wastes. Ideally, it is recycled or reused or minimized or something of that nature, but after WW II when the chemical first started to be used, that was not a top of the line concern. The wastes were sent to a landfill, covered with dirt and out of sight, out of mind. Hundreds of companies did the same thing and anyone that lives near a waste disposable site knows the issues.

The problem is overtime water falls onto the landfill, the wastes breakdown and the chemicals get into the drinking water system. There are solutions, but solutions can be expensive and plant managers were tasked at getting rid of the waste problem at the lowest cost. The issue is always when did a company know about the affects of the wastes and in particular their waste problem.

In the book, which is set in West Virginia, people worked in the Dupont Chemical plant and were paid a middle-income salary which allowed them to have a lengthy career at the company. At the same time, over time the company donated money to parks and schools so most people in the community had positive feelings for the company. Downstream from the landfill was farms and one particular farmer saw his cows die frequently. In 2 years, more than 190 cows were lost, what is going on and how to fix it?

The author of the book started his career as an environmental lawyer defending chemical companies, but because of a personal family connection took the case from the farmer. Initially he thought Dupont was going to be a good citizen and he could work with the company because they were cut from the same cloth. It turns out DuPont did everything in their power, which was plenty to not give information, but every once in a while, Mr. Bilott would discover an email or text referencing an issue. Then it would be more discover and research till he found out what chemical was in the landfill.

Then it would be months before he found out the chemical experts knew about the potential side effects but did nothing except to stonewall the information. If you know where to look, and eventually how the game is played, it is possible to find answers. Upon finding answers then it takes the legal system to bring out penalties and potential solutions.

Eventually Mr. Bilott won the lawsuits, because after using every potential legal avenue they ran out and had to admit responsibility and pay damages.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, some of the solutions would have lessened profits but the company would have continued to make profits. However, the company took the easy way out and then the legal way. which is to delay for as long as possible. The chemicals are still in the water system and everyone in the world has some in their blood because the chemicals have wide use in our daily activities. They also have consequences such as higher cancer rates for people using the chemicals directly. Perhaps the risk analysis for Dupont always came ahead with the status quo. It is nice if a company does the correct thing and branches out to different avenues to making money. For example in this case, if a water treatment plant uses carbon filtration it reduces the amount to 99% acceptable standards. The company could have invested and used its government influence to have carbon filtration mandatory for its new business. Solves a problem and offers a solution, but it did not.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, we often think that because we have a connection to a company that they will do right by you. In reality that is not really the case, although it can happen. For your investments, do the companies really do the right thing? or they expecting someone else to do it?

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.