[Avodah] T'uM

[Zev Sero]

bdcohen at optimum.net wrote:

>>> Micha's question, it seems to me, is whether he has a moral
>>> obligation to re-pay he debt irrespective of legal obligations.  

>> Why should he? Where would such a moral obligation come from? The
>> whole *point* of setting up a LLC is to avoid such an obligation!

> That is the question. The whole "point" of using a corporate entity is 
> to shield your personal assets from the obligations of the business. It 
> certainly avoids the "legal" obligation to re-pay the debt from personal 
> assets. The question, IMHO, does the creditor'  knowledge that he is 
> loaning money to an LLC also provide the debtor with a pass on any moral 
> obligation to pay the debt besides what the law requires

Why shouldn't it?  What's the hava amina otherwise?


> or is that 
> knowledge irrelevant, since the creditor, from a moral point of view, 
> can rely on the integrity of this ben Torah to pay his debts even if 
> there is no legal obligation to do so.

But why would he expect him to feel such an obligation?  RMB isn't asking
anything, he assumes without question that the borrower *has* such an
obligation, and I'm asking why?  They're not his debts, they're the
corporation's, and he set up the corporation for the explicit purpose
that its debts *wouldn't* be his.  So why should he suddenly feel that
they are his after all?

-- 
Zev Sero               Something has gone seriously awry with this Court's
zev at sero.name          interpretation of the Constitution.
                      	                          - Clarence Thomas