卡莉?費歐莉娜1999年7月入主惠普后立即采取的措施之一是回購股票。2005年費歐莉娜下臺時，惠普已累計回購股票140億美元，超過了這六年間創造的120億美元利潤。

費歐莉娜的繼任者馬克?赫德當了五年CEO，在此期間他為回購股票甚至投入了更多資金，共計430億美元，而在他任期內，惠普的總利潤為360億美元。在赫德之后，任期僅11個月的李艾科在2011年卸任前也動用了100億美元來回購股票。

這三位CEO在十幾年時間里采取了同樣的策略，而這項策略在過去20年中已經成為許多美國大公司的常態，那就是用大量現金來回購股票，同時借收購來提高收入水平。

這些回購行動讓大批資金流入股東手中。長期而言，這樣做能為惠普帶來哪些好處并不明朗。多年來，惠普一直未能推出重量級產品。在更有利可圖的軟件與服務領域，惠普遲遲未能有所建樹。該公司核心業務的收入和利潤率也不斷下降。

惠普的困境體現了全球市場的快速變化，大多數大型企業都因此面臨壓力。同時，在本輪經濟擴張進入第六年之際，越來越多的批評人士都指出，耗資數百億美元來回購股票制約了惠普等公司應對市場變化的能力。他們認為，把資金用在這方面妨礙了創新，延緩了增長，加劇了收入失衡局面，而且削弱了美國的競爭力。

馬薩諸塞大學洛威爾分校經濟學教授、工業競爭力中心主任威廉?拉左尼克說：“惠普是創新型企業的典范，這樣的企業會把利潤留下來，再將其用于提升員工的創造能力。但1999年以來，該公司不斷壓縮員工隊伍，并將利潤交給股東，這無異于自我毀滅?！?/p>

惠普方面拒絕就本文發表評論。

在現任CEO梅格?惠特曼指揮下，惠普剛剛完成了歷史上規模最大的公司分拆，建立了從事個人電腦和打印機業務的惠普公司（HP Inc.）和從事企業硬件與服務的惠普企業（HP Enterprise）。為了扭虧和重組，惠普最終將裁員8萬人。

路透社分析師指出，許多公司都在沿著同樣的道路大踏步前進，它們的股票回購增速超過了為長期增長投入的資金，比如研發以及其他形式的資本支出。

路透社查看了3297家美國非金融上市公司，2010年以來一直在回購股票的公司幾乎占60%。2014財年，這些公司在股票回購和分紅方面的支出超過了它們的凈利潤總和，這是非經濟衰退期首次出現這種情況。已經公布2015財年業績的公司有613家，它們在這方面的開支也繼續上升。

在2014財年，這3297家公司股票回購規模達到了創紀錄的5200億美元。再加上3650億美元的分紅，返還給股東的資金總額為8850億美元，超過了這些公司8470億美元的利潤。

路透社分析師指出，和經營性投資相比，回購和分紅費用呈迅猛增長態勢。2010年以來一直在回購股票的1900家公司，它們用于回購和分紅的資金是資本支出的113%。2000年這個數字為60%，1990年為38%。

回購股票并披露了研發支出的公司約有1000家。2009年以來，這些公司的創新支出/凈利潤比例平均不到50%；2014年這個數字才因凈利潤下降而增至56%。在20世紀90年代，該比率一直高于60%。

在經濟學家的論述中，美國公司越發金融化，回購股票則是其中的一部分，而且這種金融工具投資正在不斷擠占其他投資的空間。

這種現象由幾個因素共同造成，包括來自維權股東的壓力；高管薪酬和每股收益及股價掛鉤，而股票回購可以提升這兩項指標；全球競爭越發激烈；以及擔心對產品和服務進行長期投資可能得不到回報。

如今，在一些最著名的創新型企業，高管們滿腦子想的都是回購和分紅。

2005年以來，IBM已斥資1250億美元來回購股票，并發放了320億美元紅利，超過了同期1110億美元的資本支出和研發投入。制藥公司輝瑞在過去10年中為回購和分紅投入了1390億美元，而研發開支和資本支出分別為820億美元和180億美元。發明了便利貼和透明膠帶的3M用了480億美元來回購股票并分紅，研發資金和資本支出則分別為160億美元和140億美元。

年報顯示，作為路透社的母公司，湯森路透集團2014年的資本支出為9.68億美元，其中逾一半用于研發。股票回購和分紅總額達20.5億美元，是資本支出的兩倍多。2014年該集團全職員工人數為5.3萬人，低于2011年的6.05萬人。2015年初以來，湯森路透的資本支出為7.43億美元，回購和分紅規模則達到20.2億美元。

湯森路透負責公司事務的高級副總裁大衛?克倫威爾說：“從資金分配的角度來說，我們總是把用于增長的再投資排在股票回購之前?！?/p>

“恐怖的情景”

理論上，除了分紅，股票回購是另一條和股東分享利潤的途徑。由于回購能提高公司股票需求并減少供應，它往往會提高股價，從而放大其積極效應，至少短期內是這樣。同時，總股本變少會推動每股收益上升，甚至是在凈利潤總額持平的情況下。

公司方面稱，如果產品和服務需求不足以體現研發支出的合理性，或者他們認為股票遭低估時，就應當回購股票；而且正因為這樣，股票回購是一種優于新項目的投資。

然而，要是這些回購是以犧牲創新為代價呢？要是股東財富的短期增長可能削弱長期競爭力呢？哈佛商學院教授、《創造繁榮：美國為什么需要制造業復興》（Producing Prosperity: Why America Needs a Manufacturing Renaissance）一書的作者加里?皮薩諾說：“從平板電視到半導體，再到光伏電池，美國在制造領域處于全面落后狀態。”

他認為，如果美國公司繼續把現金派發給投資者，經濟性投資“就會流向能得到充分利用的地方。如果德國、印度或巴西的公司有需要這些投資的地方，這些資金就會流向那里，而且也應該如此，從而為當地帶來增長和活力，而不是為美國。這是一種恐怖的情景。”

隨著國防預算不斷萎縮，軍工企業越來越難以為研究開支找到正當理由，這甚至可能威脅到美國的國土安全。

美國航空航天工業協會CEO大衛?梅爾徹指出，由于缺乏新的武器項目，再加上來自華爾街的壓力，公司紛紛開始轉向股票回購。

梅爾徹說：“這些公司的投資團體和關注它們的分析師都在說‘我們想要更高的回報率，我們希望每股收益上升’。除非這些公司都準備退市，否則這就不是一種可持續的長期策略……就連華爾街分析師有時也會異口同聲地說，‘你們什么時候能提高業績？’”

在幾家最大的軍工企業中，諾斯洛普格拉曼公司2010年以來共投入逾120億美元來回購股票，即便過去五年收入水平連續滑坡。2010年至今，洛克希德-馬丁公司的收入一直持平，而該公司的股票回購規模幾乎也達到了120億美元。

最近幾個月，隨著2016年大選逐漸升溫，瘋狂回購股票的長期效應所引發的擔憂開始闖入公眾的視野，也引起了政壇人物的注意。

民主黨參議員伊麗莎白?沃倫和塔米?鮑德溫已經要求美國證監會將股票回購作為操縱市場的潛在手段進行調查。

民主黨總統候選人希拉里?克林頓的競選綱領已經提出，要把公司的關注焦點從短期轉向長期。她在2015年7月建議提高短期投資稅收，并就披露股票回購和高管薪酬信息做出更嚴格的要求。她表示，這些措施將促進長期投資，帶動創新并提高普通員工收入。

借助自己的企業高管背景，前惠普CEO費歐莉娜現已成為共和黨總統候選人。記者曾多次要求她就此發表評論，但均遭到拒絕。

另一位前惠普CEO赫德現任甲骨文公司聯合首席執行官。他在接受路透社采訪時說，回購股票是使用資金的恰當方式。他認為：“惠普現金充足，能按自己想要的規模來回購股票?！焙盏聯蜟EO期間，惠普創造的經營性現金流為620億美元，比他為回購投入的資金多三分之一。赫德表示：“這是對資金的妥善利用?！?/p>

赫德在任時，惠普的收入和股價雙雙上升。他說股票回購規模和研發投資沒有關系。在赫德的任期內，惠普共為研發投入了170億美元。

赫德的繼任者李艾科的發言人拒絕就此發表評論。

制約管理者

1982年以前，美國基本上不允許公司回購股票。在那一年，作為羅納德?里根總統全面放松金融市場管制的舉措之一，美國證監會放寬了限制，允許公司在公開市場上購買自己的股票。

當時的自由市場改革者指出，二戰以后，經過幾十年的增長，美國公司已變得臃腫而浪費，對于經營者如何使用資金，或者不使用資金的情況缺乏監督。

特拉華大學金融學教授、約翰?L?溫伯格公司治理中心主任查爾斯?埃爾森說：“當時，公司董事都是經營者本人和他們的朋友。權力基本上在管理層手中，而且不受制約。”

不過，當時人們已經逐漸形成了一種觀點，那就是公司的首要目標是盡量為股東創造價值，就算這意味著要通過股票回購和分紅向股東派發現金，而這些資金本來可能用于長期經營性投資。

俄亥俄州立大學費舍爾商學院金融學教授伊薩克?本-大衛對回購股票持贊成態度。他在回答路透社問題的電子郵件中寫道：“為消費者服務，推出創新型新產品，雇傭員工，保護環境……這些都不是公司的目標。它們是一個過程的組成部分，這個過程的目標則是盡量讓股東獲得更多價值?！?/p>

這個目標在最近的一些知名案例中備受關注。維權投資者要求公司高管分享財富，否則就可能趕他們下臺。

2015年3月，通用汽車同意回購50億美元的股票，以便讓投資者哈里?威爾森感到滿意。后者曾威脅說，通用汽車擺脫破產保護狀態后，在短短幾年時間里就積攢了250億美元現金，如果不拿出部分資金跟股東分享，他就去爭奪該公司的董事席位。

杜邦公司2014年宣布將斥資50億美元回購股票，2015年初又披露了一項價值40億美元的股票回購計劃，目的是阻擊維權投資者納爾遜?佩爾茨的基金公司Trian Fund Management，后者打算拿下四個董事席位，以便控制杜邦。盡管如此，該公司CEO柯愛倫還是因銷售額增速放慢以及股價下跌在2015年10月辭職。

2015年3月，迫于對沖基金公司Jana Partners的壓力，高通公司同意在隨后12個月里斥資100億美元回購股票；此前高通已制定了78億美元的股票回購方案，并承諾將把四分之三的自由現金流返還給股東。然而，在過去10年中，該公司股票在大多數時間里的表現都不如標普500指數。

但Jana Partners并不買賬。7月份，高通宣布將裁員近5000人，而且還會采取其他措施來削減成本。該公司表示，研發支出仍將保持每年約40億美元的水平。

無視股東要求的管理者需要自擔風險，特別是在公司股價面臨壓力的時候。拉斯?丹尼爾斯是一位技術和管理高管，曾在蘋果公司和惠普分別任職15年和13年。他在惠普的職位是企業服務首席技術官，于2012年離職。丹尼爾斯說：“沒有哪條要求有選擇的余地。如果不予理會，你就會下臺。這些要求其實都跟資源配置有關……目前的情況是許多投資者都相信，在如何使用資源的問題上，自己的決定要比企業管理層的好?！?/p>

作為軟件、硬件和服務供應商，IBM曾是美國科技公司中的佼佼者。2014年，該公司為研發投入了54.3億美元。用于回購股票的資金則一直遠高于這個數字。

幾十年來，IBM的高管薪酬一直和每股收益掛鉤，而通過股票回購就可以操控這項指標。2007年至今，IBM的每股收益飆升了66%，但凈利潤總額只增長了15%（該公司在提交給監管部門的文件中稱，它在考核高管績效時就股票回購對每股收益的影響做了相應調整）。

在借助財務手段來提高每股收益方面，IBM一直是做得最露骨的公司之一。2007年，在和股東進行溝通時，IBM拿出了第一份提升每股收益的“路線圖”，當時提出的目標是到2010年讓每股收益達到10美元。按照這個方案，該公司將對提高利潤率、收購、收入增長率和股票回購給予同樣的重視。IBM輕而易舉就實現了這個目標。

2010年，時任IBM首席執行官的彭明盛更進一步，承諾到2015年讓每股收益增長75%以上，達到20美元。這次，IBM預計逾三分之一的增長將通過回購股票來實現。彭明盛于2011年卸任，他任職最后三年的薪酬超過了8700萬美元。

在一段時間里，這項計劃起了作用。IBM的股價在2013年3月達到215美元的歷史最高點。但該公司的經營業績并未跟上股價上漲的腳步。

近三年IBM的收入已經減少。利潤也連續兩年下滑。和2013年的高點相比，該公司股價已回落三分之一，標普500指數則上漲了34%。為控制成本，IBM進行了裁員。目前該公司員工人數比2012年少了5.5萬人。

湯姆?米奇利在IBM設在紐約州波基普西市的工廠工作了30年。他說：“看到公司裁員后，員工的士氣不是太高。”米奇利指出，近年來自己的工資漲幅已經沒有原來那么高，IBM為員工繳納的401(k)養老金（美國一種特殊的退休儲蓄計劃）也在減少。

IBM發言人伊恩?科利稱，匯率波動和業務剝離給該公司業績帶來了不利影響。IBM仍在增長，而且股票回購不會影響該公司的研發和創新工作。他說：“IBM的首要任務是對業務進行投資”，比如最近在云計算等領域實施的收購。

財富效應

在股票回購的幫助下，美國股市已從金融危機時的低谷攀升到了歷史高點。因此，股東覺得自己比以前富有多了，薪酬和股價掛鉤的公司高管也有同感。

一些經濟學家指出，勞動者為這些財富買了單，因為它削減了支持長期增長的資本支出，進而影響了就業。此外，由于大多數美國公司的股票由最富裕的美國人持有，股價上升并不能給普通勞動者帶來同等收益。

拉左尼克說，因此，盡量為股東創造價值的做法“讓收入集中在社會上層，并且造成中產階層失去工作機會。和40年前相比，美國經濟的富裕程度提高了一倍，但大多數人都覺得自己更窮了。”

保羅?布盧姆在IBM管理層任職16年，擔任過通信研究首席技術官等職位，2013年卸任。他是樂觀派之一，認為風投資本以及研發投資的其他替代渠道將起到一些彌補作用，從而為創新和經濟增長提供支持。

如今在風投公司擔任顧問的布盧姆預計，大企業的注意力將從直接投資于研發轉向收購初創公司和剝離試驗性項目，這些公司和項目不怎么受制度和華爾街要求的約束。他說：“大家會發現，和以前相比投資于初創型企業的公司將越來越多?！?/p>

在過去的100年里，許多改變了世界的突破性進展，比如燈泡、激光、計算機、航空和航天技術都以實驗室創新為基礎，而且這樣的創新都來自IBM、蘋果、施樂和惠普等資金實力雄厚的公司。

有些人認為，在技術層面惠普和IBM等公司正在遠離需要大量廠房和設備投資的傳統制造業，并且轉向以數據為基礎的產品，這也改變了創新所需投資的計算方法。

馬克?迪安在IBM研發部門工作了34年，曾參與研制了1981年誕生的第一臺個人計算機。他說：“這些公司花錢的方式與眾不同，此類投資也很難計算。大家也許認為它們的支出在原地踏步，但我覺得資金得到了更好的利用。創新正在發生變化。”

惠普之道

在很長一段時間里，惠普一直堅持著“惠普之道”，這種平等主義企業哲學得到了外界的普遍贊賞。經營性部門在發展業務方面高度自主?；萜战⒘伺嘤铜h境并鼓勵員工進行創造性思維，研發支出在收入中占的比重也總是超過10%。

1999年上任的費歐莉娜改變了這一切，她實施了全方位裁員，把工作機會轉移到海外，并將控制權集中了起來。

比爾?穆特爾曾是惠普高級副總裁，2001年惠普斥資250億美元收購康柏電腦后他成了后者的一員。在費歐莉娜競選團隊建議下，穆特爾接受了路透社的采訪。他說，費歐莉娜做出了惠普需要的改變，原因是該公司當時在創新方面已經變得毫無建樹，惠普“總是在瞄準，瞄準，再瞄準，卻從未實施和執行。”

費歐莉娜上任前不久，惠普剝離了一項業務，后者成為現在的安捷倫科技公司，并且帶走了很多高科技人才。

在研發方面，費歐莉娜的關注重點是把獲取專利作為提高開支效率的手段。惠普提交給監管部門的文件顯示，2002年該公司注冊了1.7萬項專利，2005年費歐莉娜卸任時這個數字已升至3萬項。

盡管如此，所有這些新專利都未能帶來任何持久而成功的創新。研發工作變得支離破碎，有些項目出現了重疊。

1999年上任時，費歐莉娜的薪酬取決于每股收益。從2003年開始，它又和股東總回報率掛了鉤，這個業績衡量標準把股價漲幅和分紅加在一起，然后和標普500指數的回報率進行比較。

2000年網絡泡沫破裂后，費歐莉娜的股票回購措施未能阻止惠普的股價下跌。在其任內，不均衡的利潤以及對收購康柏的質疑不斷打擊著惠普的股價，這也是促成她2005年下臺的原因之一。

收購康柏后惠普變得臃腫起來，赫德則理順了惠普的結構。他把研究項目從6800個削減到40個左右，在個人電腦和打印機部門全面壓縮成本，并將惠普的重心轉移到打造利潤率更高的軟件與服務業務上。

各項業務的市場份額都得到了提升。但研究者指出，在個人電腦和打印機部門，限制支出的新規打亂了項目時間表。據一些曾在惠普工作的工程師介紹，為達到赫德提出的目標，每到季末，一些難以做到這一點的經理就會凍結支出，暫停物資采購。

其中一位工程師說：“不能像水龍頭一樣開開關關。不能為了季度業績好看就節流，下一季度再重新投入也不會立即帶來很棒的產品?！?/p>

此前在美國造出產品原型的惠普工程師如今得依靠設在亞洲的制造基地來進行生產。受開支壓力影響，到亞洲出差的計劃有時會被推遲。惠普實驗室的工作人員也離開了更具試驗性的項目，轉而為現有產品線提供服務。

赫德在接受采訪時說，自己當時不知道存在凍結支出和項目受到干擾的情況。

他做出的調整取得了輝煌成果。從2005年到2010年，惠普的凈利潤增長了265%，收入增幅則低得多，只有45%。赫德任職期間，惠普的股價上漲了一倍多，從20美元升至50美元。

由于大量回購股票，每股收益的表現更為優異，增長了350%。惠普用于股票回購的資金從2005年的35.1億美元增至2006年的77.8億美元，在隨后五年里，有四個年頭的股票回購規模都超過了90億美元（其中約20-30%抵消了員工持股計劃帶來的攤薄效應）。

赫德說，在惠普任職期間，他最關注的一直是提高收入和擴大市場份額。

他表示：“股價是公司業績的體現。提高每股收益進而推動股價上升的短期手段通常都不會奏效……對外宣稱將減少分紅，進行一次性股票回購，這些都類似于在家里玩的把戲，不會持久。”他還說，自己曾多次拒絕股東的要求，包括增加分紅以及效仿IBM的“路線圖”提高每股收益。

由于赫德幾乎總是能實現每股收益等業績目標，他的酬勞基本上也呈上升態勢。舉例來說，2008年赫德拿到了4200萬美元薪酬，遠高于上年的2500萬美元（由于績效不達標，2009年這個數字降至3000萬美元）。

惠普業績的好轉打動了投資者。在費歐莉娜治下，該公司的營業利潤率一度跌至5%以下，赫德上任后，營業利潤率升至9%，股價也猛漲了200%。

2010年8月，赫德因為和承包商的關系丑聞曝光而黯然下課。

他的繼任者李艾科擔任CEO的時間不足一年，在此期間的一項重大決策是在2011年10月斥資110億美元收購軟件公司Autonomy。一年后，也就是李艾科下臺后，惠普稱調查發現Autonomy在此項收購前做了假賬，自身利潤將因此下調近90億美元。

惠普的打算是從扭虧過渡到增長，現任CEO惠特曼一直想在這方面求得平衡。2014年，該公司研發開支略有增長，升至34.5億美元，這是2008年以來的最高水平，并未受到收入下降的影響。同時，股票回購規模從2013年的15億美元增至27億美元。

惠普一分為二后，惠特曼隨即就會面臨一項挑戰，那就是把惠普企業打造成高利潤率公司。分拆后的兩家公司都將繼續大量回購股票。2015年9月份，惠普企業（HP Enterprise）預計，2016年它將通過回購和分紅把至少50%的自由現金流返還給股東?；萜展荆℉P Inc.）承諾的現金返還率更是達到75%。（財富中文網）

譯者：Charlie

校對：詹妮

When Carly Fiorina started at Hewlett-Packard in July 1999, one of her first acts as CEO was to start buying back the company’s shares. By the time she was ousted in 2005, HP had snapped up $14 billion of its stock, more than its $12 billion in profits during that time.

Her successor, Mark Hurd, spent even more on buybacks during his five years in charge—$43 billion, compared to profits of $36 billion. Following him, Leo Apotheker bought back $10 billion in shares before his 11-month tenure ended in 2011.

The three CEOs, over the span of a dozen years, followed a strategy that has become the norm for many big companies during the past two decades: large stock buybacks to make use of cash, coupled with acquisitions to lift revenue.

All those buybacks put lots of money in the hands of shareholders. How well they served HP in the long term isn’t clear. HP hasn’t had a blockbuster product in years. It has been slow to make a mark in more profitable software and services businesses. In its core businesses, revenue, and margins have been contracting.

HP’s troubles reflect rapid shifts in the global marketplace that pressure most large companies. But six years into the current expansion, a growing chorus of critics argues that the ability of HP and companies like it to respond to those shifts is being hindered by billions of dollars in buybacks. These financial maneuvers, they argue, cannibalize innovation, slow growth, worsen income inequality, and harm U.S. competitiveness.

“HP was the poster child of an innovative enterprise that retained profits and reinvested in the productive capabilities of employees. Since 1999, however, it has been destroying itself by downsizing its labor force and distributing its profits to shareholders,” said William Lazonick, a professor of economics and director of the Center for Industrial Competitiveness at the University of Massachusetts-Lowell.

HP declined to comment for this article.

CEO Meg Whitman has just overseen one of the largest corporate breakups ever attempted, creating one company for the PC and printer business, called HP Inc. HPQ -0.52% , and one for the corporate hardware and services business, called HP Enterprise HPE -1.20% . Ultimately, HP’s turnaround efforts and restructuring will cost 80,000 jobs.

A Reuters analysis shows that many companies are barreling down the same road, spending on share repurchases at a far faster pace than they are investing in long-term growth through research and development and other forms of capital spending.

Almost 60% of the 3,297 publicly traded non-financial U.S. companies Reuters examined have bought back their shares since 2010. In fiscal 2014, spending on buybacks and dividends surpassed the companies’ combined net income for the first time outside of a recessionary period, and continued to climb for the 613 companies that have already reported for fiscal 2015.

In the most recent reporting year, share purchases reached a record $520 billion. Throw in the most recent year’s $365 billion in dividends, and the total amount returned to shareholders reaches $885 billion, more than the companies’ combined net income of $847 billion.

The analysis shows that spending on buybacks and dividends has surged relative to investment in the business. Among the 1,900 companies that have repurchased their shares since 2010, buybacks and dividends amounted to 113% of their capital spending, compared with 60% in 2000 and 38% in 1990.

And among the approximately 1,000 firms that buy back shares and report R&D spending, the proportion of net income spent on innovation has averaged less than 50% since 2009, increasing to 56% only in the most recent year as net income fell. It had been over 60% during the 1990s.

Share repurchases are part of what economists describe as the increasing “financialization” of the U.S. corporate sector, whereby investment in financial instruments increasingly crowds out other types of investment.

The phenomenon is the result of several converging forces: pressure from activist shareholders; executive compensation programs that tie pay to per-share earnings and share prices that buybacks can boost; increased global competition; and fear of making long-term bets on products and services that may not pay off.

It now pervades the thinking in the executive suites of some of the most legendary U.S. innovators.

IBM IBM 0.08% has spent $125 billion on buybacks since 2005, and $32 billion on dividends, more than its $111 billion in capital spending and R&D during the same period. Pharmaceuticals maker Pfizer PFE -0.87% spent $139 billion on buybacks and dividends in the past decade, compared to $82 billion on R&D and $18 billion in capital spending. 3M MMM -0.75% , creator of the Post-it Note and Scotch Tape, spent $48 billion on buybacks and dividends, compared to $16 billion on R&D and $14 billion in capital spending.

At Thomson Reuters Corp, owner of Reuters News, capital spending last year totaled $968 million, more than half of which went toward R&D, according to the company’s annual report. Buybacks and dividends for the year were more than double that figure, at a combined $2.05 billion. The company had 53,000 full-time employees last year, down from 60,500 in 2011. So far this year, capital spending is at $743 million, while buybacks and dividends total $2.02 billion.

“From a capital allocation perspective, we will always prioritize re-investments in our growth priorities over share buybacks,” said David Crundwell, senior vice president, corporate affairs, at Thomson Reuters.

“A Scary Scenario”

In theory, buybacks add another way, on top of dividends, of sharing profits with shareholders. Because buybacks increase demand and reduce supply for a company’s shares, they tend to increase the share price, at least in the short-term, amplifying the positive effect. By decreasing the number of shares outstanding, they also increase earnings per share, even when total net income is flat.

Companies say buybacks are warranted when demand for their products and services isn’t enough to justify spending on R&D, or when they deem their shares to be undervalued, and therefore a better investment than new projects.

But if those buybacks come at the expense of innovation, short-term gains in shareholder wealth could harm long-term competitiveness. “The U.S. is behind on production of everything from flat-panel TVs to semiconductors and solar photovoltaic cells,” said Gary Pisano, a professor at Harvard Business School and author of Producing Prosperity: Why America Needs a Manufacturing Renaissance.

If U.S. companies continue to dole out their cash to investors, he said, economic investment “will go where it can be used well. If a company in Germany, India, or Brazil has something to do with the money, it will flow there, as it should, and create growth and activity there, not in the United States. It’s a scary scenario.”

Even national security could be threatened as a shrinking defense budget has made it more difficult for contractors to justify research spending.

David Melcher, CEO of the Aerospace Industries Association, said companies have turned to buybacks because of a dearth of new weapons programs and under pressure from Wall Street.

“Their investment community and the analysts that cover them are all saying, ‘We want a better return and we want EPS to grow,’ ” Melcher said. “That’s not a sustainable long-term strategy unless all these companies are going to go private. … Even the Wall Street analyst crowd at some point will say, ‘When are you going to grow?’ ”

Among the largest U.S. defense contractors, Northrop Grummanhas spent more than $12 billion on share repurchases since 2010, even as revenue has declined in each of the past five years. Lockheed Martin’s revenue has been flat since 2010; it has spent almost $12 billion on buybacks in that time.

In recent months, as the 2016 election campaigns have gathered momentum, concern about the long-term effects of the buyback craze has crept into public discourse and caught the attention of politicians.

Democrat Senators Elizabeth Warren and Tammy Baldwin have called on the Securities and Exchange Commission to investigate buybacks as a potential form of market manipulation.

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has made shifting companies’ short-term focus to the long term a plank of her campaign. In July, she proposed increasing taxes on short-term investments and more rigorous disclosure of share repurchases and executive compensation. These moves, she said, will foster longer-term investment, innovation and higher pay for workers.

Fiorina, now a Republican presidential contender running on her record as a corporate executive, declined multiple requests for comment.

Hurd, now a co-CEO at Oracle, told Reuters that repurchases were an appropriate use of capital. “HP had plenty of cash to buy back as much stock as it wanted to,” he said in an interview. Operating cash flow during his tenure was $62 billion, a third more than he spent on buybacks. “It’s a good use of capital,” he said.

HP’s revenue and share price rose while Hurd was in charge. He said decisions about the size of stock buybacks and investment in R&D, which totaled $17 billion during his tenure, were not related.

A spokesman for Apotheker, Hurd’s successor, declined to comment.

To Rein in Managers

Until 1982, companies were largely prohibited from buying their own shares. That year, as part of President Ronald Reagan’s broad moves to deregulate financial markets, the SEC eased its rules to allow companies to buy their own shares on the open market.

At the time, free-market reformers argued that corporate America had become fat and wasteful after decades of postwar growth, with no checks on how managers spent cash—or didn’t.

“The boards you had were managers themselves and their friends,” said Charles Elson, finance professor and director of the John L. Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance at the University of Delaware. “It was basically managerial power, unchecked.”

Over the years, however, a belief has taken hold that companies’ primary objective is to maximize shareholder value, even if that means paying out now through buybacks and dividends money that could be put toward long-term productive investments.

“Serving customers, creating innovative new products, employing workers, taking care of the environment … are NOT the objectives of firms,” Itzhak Ben-David, professor of finance at Ohio State University’s Fisher College of Business and a buyback proponent, wrote in an email response to questions from Reuters. “These are components in the process that have the goal of maximizing shareholders’ value.”

That goal has come to the fore in some high-profile cases of late as activist investors have demanded that executives share the wealth—or risk being unseated.

In March, General Motors GM 0.11% acceded to a $5 billion share buyback to satisfy investor Harry Wilson. He had threatened a proxy fight if the auto maker didn’t distribute some of the $25 billion cash hoard it had built up after emerging from bankruptcy just a few years earlier.

DuPont DD -0.25% early this year announced a $4 billion buyback program—on top of a $5 billion program announced a year earlier—to beat back activist investor Nelson Peltz’s Trian Fund Management, which was seeking four board seats to get its way. Even so, CEO Ellen Kullman stepped down in October after sales slowed and the stock slid.

In March, Qualcomm, under pressure from hedge fund Jana Partners, agreed to boost its program to purchase $10 billion of its shares over the next 12 months; the company already had an existing $7.8 billion buyback program and a commitment to return three quarters of its free cash flow to shareholders. Still, the stock had been underperforming the S&P 500 for most of the past 10 years.

Jana wasn’t satisfied, and in July, Qualcomm announced it would shed nearly 5,000 workers, among other moves to cut costs. R&D spending, it said, would stay at around $4 billion a year.

Managers ignore shareholder demands at their own risk, especially when the share price is under pressure. “None of it is optional. If you ignore them, you go away,” said Russ Daniels, a technology and management executive who spent 15 years at Apple Inc and then 13 years at HP, where he was chief technology officer for enterprise services when he left in 2012. “It’s all just resource allocation … The situation right now is there are a lot of investors who believe that they can make a better decision about how to apply that resource than the management of the business can.”

IBM, once the grande dame of U.S. tech companies, spent $5.43 billion on R&D in the most recent year. It has been spending a lot more on buybacks.

For decades, the computer hardware, software and services company has linked executive pay in part to earnings per share, a metric that can be manipulated by share repurchases. Since 2007, IBM’s per-share earnings have surged 66%, though total net income has risen only 15%. (The company says in regulatory filings that it adjusts for the impact of buybacks on EPS when determining pay targets.)

IBM has been among the most explicit in its pursuit of higher per-share earnings through financial engineering. In 2007, in communications with shareholders, it laid out the first of its “road maps” for boosting EPS, this time to $10 a share by 2010. It would do so, under the plan, through equal emphasis on improved margins, acquisitions, revenue growth, and share repurchases. It easily met its expectations.

In 2010, then-CEO Sam Palmisano doubled down, pledging to boost earnings by more than 75% to $20 a share by 2015. This time, more than a third of that increase was expected to come from buybacks. Palmisano left in 2011, having received more than $87 million in compensation in his last three years at the company.

For a while, the plan worked. Shares surged to an all-time high of $215 in March 2013. But the company’s operating results have lagged.

Revenue has declined for the past three years. Earnings have fallen for the past two. The stock is down a third from its 2013 peak, while the S&P 500 has risen 34%. To rein in costs, IBM has cut jobs. It now employs 55,000 fewer workers than it did in 2012.

“Morale is not too good when you see these cuts,” said Tom Midgley, a 30-year veteran of IBM’s Poughkeepsie, N.Y. plant. In recent years, he said, his wage increases have shrunk, as has the company’s contribution to 401(k) retirement savings.

IBM spokesman Ian Colley said that the company’s results have been hurt by currency shifts and business divestitures. He said that the company continues to grow, and that its buybacks have not affected research, development and innovation efforts. “IBM prioritizes investment in the business,” he said, citing recent acquisitions in cloud and other areas.

Wealth Benefit

Share repurchases have helped the stock market climb to records from the depths of the financial crisis. As a result, shareholders and corporate executives whose pay is linked to share prices are feeling a lot wealthier.

That wealth, some economists argue, has come at the expense of workers by cutting into the capital spending that supports long-term growth—and jobs. Further, because most U.S. stock is held by the wealthiest Americans, workers haven’t benefited equally from rising share prices.

Thus, said Lazonick, the economics professor, maximizing shareholder value has “concentrated income at the top and has led to the disappearance of middle-class jobs. The U.S. economy is now twice as rich in real terms as it was 40 years ago, but most people feel poorer.”

Paul Bloom, who was an executive at IBM for 16 years, including chief technology officer for telecom research before leaving in 2013, is among the optimists who argue that venture capital and other alternative channels of R&D investment will take up some of the slack, supporting innovation and economic growth.

Now a consultant to venture capital firms, Bloom expects large companies to shift away from investing directly in R&D, focusing instead on acquiring startups and spinning off experimental projects that will be less constrained by bureaucracy and Wall Street demands. “You are going to see more and more corporate investing in the startups than you have in the past,” he said.

Many of the transformative breakthroughs of the past century—light bulbs, lasers, computers, aviation, and aerospace technologies—were based on innovations coming out of the labs of companies that could afford rich funding, like IBM, Apple, Xerox, and HP.

Some say a technological shift at companies like HP and IBM away from traditional manufacturing, which requires large investments in buildings and equipment, and toward data-based products is also changing the calculation of how much investment is needed in innovation.

“The way these companies spend dollars is different, the type of investment is hard to count. While you might think their spending is flat, I think it’s better utilized,” said Mark Dean, who worked in R&D for 34 years at IBM and was a member of the team that created the first personal computer in 1981. “Innovation is changing.”

The HP Way

For years, HP adhered to “the HP way,” a widely admired egalitarian corporate philosophy. Operating divisions were given broad autonomy to develop their businesses. Employees were encouraged to think creatively in a nurturing environment. R&D spending regularly topped 10% of revenue.

When Fiorina arrived in 1999, she upended that, implementing companywide layoffs, shifting jobs overseas and centralizing control.

Bill Mutell, a former HP senior vice president who joined from Compaq after HP paid $25 billion for it in 2001, spoke to Reuters at the suggestion of Fiorina’s presidential campaign. He said that changes she implemented were needed because the company had become sluggish at innovation. HP would “aim, aim, and aim, and there was never any implementation and execution,” he said.

Fiorina joined soon after the company had spun off what is now Agilent Technologies A 2.81% , the arm that housed much of the company’s high-tech expertise.

In R&D, she focused on winning patents as a measure of the effectiveness of spending. The number of HP-registered patents rose from 17,000 in 2002 to 30,000 when she left in 2005, according to regulatory filings.

Even so, all of those new patents failed to yield any enduringly successful innovations. R&D efforts were scattered, and some projects overlapped.

Fiorina’s compensation was linked in part to earnings per share when she joined in 1999. And from 2003, it was also linked to something called total shareholder return, a measure of performance, including stock-price appreciation plus dividends, that was then compared to returns for the S&P 500 Index.

Fiorina’s buybacks failed to stop HP’s share price slide after the dot-com bubble burst in 2000. Uneven earnings and concern about the Compaq acquisition whipsawed the share price during her tenure, helping lead to her ouster in 2005.

Hurd streamlined the company’s structure, which had ballooned after the Compaq acquisition. He slashed the number of research projects, from 6,800 to about 40, and cut costs across the company’s PC and printer divisions, focusing instead on building higher-margin software and services businesses.

Market share in each division grew. But in the PC and printer divisions, researchers said, new limits on spending disrupted project timelines. Some managers struggling to meet Hurd’s targets implemented spending freezes as the end of a quarter neared, halting procurement of supplies, according to former HP engineers.

“You can’t turn it on and off like a faucet, turn it off one quarter to make the quarterly results look good, then turn it back on next quarter and have great products coming out the other end,” said a former HP engineer.

Engineers at HP who had previously created prototypes at U.S. facilities were also now relying on Asian manufacturing sites to build them. Travel to these regions was on occasion delayed due to spending pressures. Workers at the company’s labs were also moved off the more experimental projects and realigned to work on existing product lines.

In the interview, Hurd said he wasn’t aware of any spending freezes or project disruptions.

The changes he implemented led to sparkling results: From 2005 to 2010, net income rose 265% on a much smaller 45% increase in revenue. HP’s stock price more than doubled, from $20 to $50, during his tenure.

Thanks to hefty stock buybacks, earnings per share did even better, increasing 350%. HP increased share repurchases from $3.51 billion in 2005 to $7.78 billion in 2006, and again to more than $9 billion a year in four of the next five years. (Roughly 20 to 30% of annual repurchases offset dilution from employee stock-purchase plans.)

Hurd said improving revenue and market share during his term was always his first concern.

“The share price is the result that occurs if the company is performing well,” he said. “Short-term tricks to try to improve EPS, and eventually share prices, usually don’t work … Going out and saying I’m going to cut a dividend, make a one-time buyback, these are sort of like parlor tricks, they aren’t sustainable.” He said he declined shareholder requests that ranged from increasing dividends to adopting a specific EPS plan like IBM’s “road map.”

Because he nearly always met per-share earnings and other targets, his pay mostly rose, too. In 2008, for example, it jumped to $42 million from $25 million the year before. (It fell in 2009 to $30 million when he failed to meet targets.)

Investors were impressed by the turnaround. Operating margins, which had dropped below 5% under Fiorina, rose as high as 9% under Hurd, and the share price soared 200%.

Hurd resigned in August 2010 amid a scandal involving his relationship to an HP contractor.

His successor, Leo Apotheker, spent just shy of a year at the helm, marked by his decision to buy software firm Autonomy for $11 billion in October 2011. A year later—after Apotheker left—HP said an investigation had uncovered accounting fraud at Autonomy before the purchase. It took a charge against earnings of nearly $9 billion.

CEO Whitman has attempted to strike a balance with HP’s plans to move into a growth mode from a turnaround effort. R&D spending rose slightly to $3.45 billion in 2014, the highest since 2008, even as revenue declined. At the same time, share repurchases rose to $2.7 billion, from $1.5 billion in 2013.

Post breakup, her immediate challenge is to build the higher-margin HP Enterprise. Both companies will continue with generous buyback programs. HP Enterprise said in September that it expects to give shareholders at least 50% of free cash flow next year through buybacks and dividends. HP Inc. said it will give back 75%.