It’s creating that result because it’s distracting companies away from fundamental value creation. And if companies are distracted from fundamental value creation, they’re empirically less valuable. The result is that it’s not just the companies that suffer, but their investors, too, because the company is not doing what it needs to thrive. And, in a low-growth world, this is also a bad policy outcome, since the broader public is barred from taking the kinds of prudent risks that delivered growth in previous generations. Remember, the Amazon.com IPO raised only $54 million.33
