Bernie Madoff: Self-Interest

In Business Ethics self-interest is defined as a number of philosophical, psychological and economic theories in looking out for one’s personal interest or advantage. This is especially true when pursued without regard to the wellbeing of others. When someone says the name Bernie Madoff the first thing that comes to most people’s minds is thief, swindler, dishonest, swindler and criminal. These labels are all undesired and socially negative connotations for any one individual to be called. When you take the name Bernie Madoff and the word “self-interest” and put them together what comes to mind is a person consumed by greed who only ever gave any thought to their own wellbeing. Keeping in line with this overall pattern of thought, one could easily say that for Bernie Madoff, self-interest was the only thing the man ever thought about! This is an understandable and logical line of thought, after all the man was convicted of 11 unique charges ranging from international money laundering to theft from an employee benefits plan and received an unprecedented 150 year prison sentence. However if we take a look at the entire scam from a different perspective, I would argue that Mr. Madoff’s actions were self-destructive and counterintuitive and detrimental to his overall wellbeing.
Mr. Madoff by all account was an

Madoff is happy now sitting in prison? Or how about when he was actually living his day to day life when perpetrating the scheme? The following is an excerpt from an interview Mr. Madoff conducted from his prison cell as narrated by TV news reporter Barbara Walters. “Bernie Madoff told me that he is happier now then he’s been in years. He said quote I feel safer here then outside. I know I will die in prison. But I lived the last 20 years of my life in fear. Now I have no fear because I’m no longer in control of my own life. When I asked him if he missed his old life, Bernie Madoff told me hell