Ethical Failures In The United States Business World

Ethical Failures in the United States Business World
A great number of unethical behaviors can be found throughout the business world. We find ourselves stunned that these behaviors can continue for such a time that they make National and International headlines. Common greed is not the only driving force behind all scandals in the business world, though it seems to have a serious influence on the individual’s choice to ignore societal behavioral standards. Regardless, whether the perpetrators simply believed they would not be caught, or their personal world view didn’t conflict with their actions, the motivations are open to interpretation. Here, we will look at some examples of ethical and moral failures in the American business environment.

Ethics, as described in the “Introduction to Business 9” glossary, are “a set of beliefs about right and wrong, good and bad” (Kelly 354). Values are defined as “beliefs of a person or social group in which they have an emotional investment (either for or against something)” (Dictionary Web). Webster defines morals as “a: of or relating to principle of right and wrong in behavior” (Merriam-Webster Web). The difference between morals and ethics is simple. Ethics focus on broadly accepted behavior of groups or society and morals are more individual. The key issue with concepts of ethical behavior is that they are derived from societal influences, and different societies have different influences to develop these behaviors. Many different religions play their part in developing concepts of; morals, values, and ethics. There are some fundamental or nearly universal values that are held throughout much of the world. Most societies have very distinct behavioral commandments that govern social behavior. Concepts like; murder, theft, assault, cheating, and lying are typically considered to be wrong. Different schools of thought lead some onto paths of choice, letting people pick which values they should emphasize in life. The topic of ethics has entire schools of study dedicated to identifying and clarifying these various dilemmas. For this paper, we will focus on the generally accepted universal concepts of ethical

To break up phone monopolies, the government split the dominant phone carriers up in the 1980’s. This resulted in more boutique or specialized carriers for local and long distance. WorldCom rose as one of the leaders in the long-distance carrier segment of phone service. They enjoyed great success in their stock price, which opens more financial leverage to grow. The problem that arose was in simple accounting practices that were fraudulently misappropriated, or “book cooking” (Investopedia Web). They began “recording operating expenses as investments” (Investopedia Web). Claiming liabilities as assets is clearly against the most basic balance sheet processes discussed in “Introduction to Business 9” (Kelly 131). Lying to both consumers, and potentially themselves, they relied on Excel model data and applied that data to future earnings. It was a clear business ethics violation. Even the independent auditor’s report seemed to back the data that WorldCom was perpetuating to consumers. It is supposed to be that auditor’s responsibility to scour and report discrepancies and verify the accounting methods used (Kelly 136). It also clearly went against the “Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP)”, as discussed in our text (Kelly 128). So much in fact that the text calls WorldCom “the