Business Ethics

Question 1

What does Philosophy mean?

Answer 1

Love of Wisdom

Question 2

What are the three main branches of philosophy?

Answer 2

Metaphysic: the fundamental nature of reality, including the relationship between mind and matter, between substance and attribute, and between possibility and actuality.

Epistemology: understanding; knowledge

Ethics: behavior

Question 3

What are the “three C’s”?

Answer 3

Compliance: with the rules, including the law, the principles of morality, the customs and expectations of the community, the policies of the company, and general concerns such as fairness

Contributions: that are made to society and through the usefulness of the activity to the surrounding community.

Consequences: of the activity both inside and outside the company, both intended and unintended, including the reputation of the company and the reputation of the industry or profession.

Question 4

What are Normative ethics?

Answer 4

How people ought to act (evaluating normality)

Question 5

What are Descriptive (scientific) ethics?

Answer 5

Study of why people act the way they do

Question 6

What are the four types of morality?

Answer 6

Norm: normal which means the usual; acceptable.

Nonmoral: have no moral hinges; manners. (out of the realm society)
Ex: car able to go 160mph

Immoral: not acceptable to society

Amoral: lacking a moral sense; unconcerned with the rightness or wrongness of something. (people typically have no regret or remorse)

Question 7

How do we define normal? Where do we obtain our morality?

Answer 7

Make a judgement and compare it to something abnormal.

Parents, school/teachers. Peers, environment, law/gov, social media, religion, culture. Your morals come from your surrounding environment.

Question 8

Define Business

Answer 8

Group of people working together for a purpose for a profit.

Question 9

Is all business self-seeking?

Answer 9

Self promoting, see professional codes

Question 10

Professional code of ethics

Answer 10

Rules that are supposed to govern the conduct of a members of a given profession; another place where we develop a sense of morality.

Ex: malpractices in the medical field, lawyers hiding evidence, accountants lying. (librarians: not require to report about a book taken out on how to build a bomb)

Question 11

Define Organization

Answer 11

Group of people working together for a purpose.

Ex: Salvation Army, Red cross, Churches, Homeless Shelters

Question 12

What are the 4 types of laws?

Answer 12

Statutes
Regulations
Common law
Constitutional law

Question 13

What are statutes?

Answer 13

Laws enacted by legislative bodies- congress and state legislatures enact statutes.

Ex: the law that defines and prohibits reckless driving on the highway is a statute.

Question 14

What are regulations?

Answer 14

(rules) made by authority and maintained by authority.

Question 15

What is common law?

Answer 15

Refers to the body of judge-made law that first developed in the english-speaking world centuries ago when there were few statutes.

Question 16

What is constitutional law?

Answer 16

Refers to court rulings on the requirements of the constitution and the constitutionality of legislation.

Question 17

Describe Religion in Morality

Answer 17

You don’t have to be religious to be moral. Morality can be shaped through whatever religion you are in.

Question 18

What are conduct ethics?

Answer 18

When an action takes place I evaluate that action as moral. Moral reasoning, thinking through something before acting.

Ex: look at conduct and evaluate conduct

Question 19

What are virtue ethics?

Answer 19

Operate off of virtues.

Ex: patience, truthfulness, good heartedness, trustworthiness

Question 20

Describe cost-benefit analysis

Answer 20

Weighing good and bad

widely utilized in both corporate and public policy decision making

A public policy context generally presupposes utilitarian ethical principles

Question 21

What is a teleological theory? (consequentialists theories)

Answer 21

Action X is moral/good/right/acceptable if Action X creates a good result.

Question 22

What are the 3 teleological theories?

Answer 22

Egoism
Utilitarianism
Hedonism

Question 23

What is egoism?

Answer 23

Action X is good/moral if it produces the best results for me or my group.

Ex: saving a person for their own benefit.
drowning person- save them for the headlines or to actually save someone

Pro: benefits you and your group and gets things done quick and efficiently.

Con: Allows for Immoral actions; creates chaos and jealousy; doesn’t acknowledge other people‘s rights.

Psychological egoism: born to be egotistical and benefit ourselves naturally.

Question 24

What is utilitarianism?

Answer 24

(most loving thing to do- Fletcher)
greatest units of happiness for greatest number of people. (Fork in road, kill four people instead of one)

Pro: brings happiness and good for testing policies in business

Con: Hard to define what happiness is and some actions are wrong even if they do produce happiness.

Any action is moral- lying, cheating, murder.. If it benefits the greatest number of happiness

Question 25

Who are Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill?

Answer 25

FATHERS OF UTILITARIANISM
Hedonistic Utilitarians

Creates most amount of joy as opposed to pain

Quantitative hedonist (Jeremy Bentham) quality of things that make it better than quantity.

Question 26

What is Ruled Utilitarianism?

Answer 26

(past tells us what to do) in the past, some kind of action/experience that I’ve been involved in that I have found out that this action worked and created the greatest amount of good for the greatest amount of people.

It worked in the past, why would it not work now?

What would Jesus do?

Question 27

What is Act Utilitarianism?

Answer 27

Liver analogy; who would get it- mother of children or 80 year old?

Famous person gets new liver even if alcoholic.

Question 28

What is Hedonism?

Answer 28

(hedonistic utilitarianisms)
Most amount of happiness

Instead of units of happiness, they believe in what creates the greatest number of content, joy, satisfaction, pleasure over pain, suffering

Question 29

What are the 5 Deontological Theories?

Answer 29

Cultural/Ethical Relativism (Carr)
Kantianism
Ross
Social Contract Theory (Ross, Plato, Hobbes)
Divine Command Theory(God)

Question 30

What is Cultural/Ethical Relativism?

Answer 30

Theory that what is right is determined by what a culture or society says is right. What is right in one place may be wrong in another, because the only criterion for distinguishing right from wrong—and so the only ethical standard for judging an action—is the moral system of the society in which the act occurs.

Creates conflict and issues trying to do business

Pro: keeps culture strong, each society knows what’s right and wrong

Con: Minority has no voices; eliminates possibility from change.. Just because majority rules doesn’t mean majority is right.

Question 31

What is Kantianism?

Answer 31

Train analogy; can’t answer because regardless it’s not ethical to kill someone.

Kantian; Immanuel Kant

Every action that is taken must be taken out of a sense of your good will; out of a sense of duty

Examine motives, motives are behind my actions

Question 32

What is Ross’s theory?

Answer 32

W.B. Ross was a Kantian

If two universal norms conflict, one is more important than the other.

Prima Facie: based on the first impression; accepted as correct until proved otherwise.

Question 33

What is Carr’s ideology?

Answer 33

Business is like “poker”

Trying to hide your bluff; to deceive competitors

Every business has its own standards of ethical relativism; culture
Ex: car business

Question 34

What is Social Contract Theory?

Answer 34

X is necessary to secure the basic common goods of persons, limit on self interest and agree to follow the rules of mutually advantageous concepts in all the concept of looking at how you would react to a certain situation.. John Ross

X is right if it doesn’t violate basic human rights

Question 35

What is Divine Command Theory?

Answer 35

X is morally right because God commands it

Question 36

What is Kant’s Categorical Imperative?

Answer 36

Look at everything categorically, look at imperatives/rules are set and universally accepted as universal norms… Kant is saying “universal norm”

Pro: takes strong person to act out of good will.

Con: not given answers when issues conflict.

Question 37

What is Robert Nozick’s theory? (right side)

Answer 37

Right to property.
Individual has a right to what an individual has or was given as long as the property was given in a fair way.
No coercing, be free to acquire property and exchange it how they wish in the free market.

Government involvement small, strong military to protect people.

Against minimum wage, favors low taxes. (Triangle- 1% can have everything, everyone else can have nothing)

Would not be into distribution; violates human rights.

Absurd to require some type of redistribution.

Question 38

What is “Libertarian Theory”?

Answer 38

Least amount of government (rejects utilitarian view)

Nozick

Question 39

What is “Entitlement Theory”?

Answer 39

Entitled to holdings if they are require lawfully/fairly. *Luck of birth
(Nozick)

Question 40

What is John Rawl’s theory? (left side)

Answer 40

(egalitarian, rejects utilitarian)
Pretend that we come together in what he calls the original position.

Insist on freedom, necessary to pursue their interest. One person’s freedom is not less or more than another person’s freedom.
Ex: hoping lowest test grade isn’t that low.

2 Principles:
Everyone has opportunity to achieve on their own merit.

People at the top should help the people at the bottom.

Equal opportunity for everyone, not OK with luck of birth. (SAT scores, people who can afford it and people who can’t; help the poor).

Question 41

What is John Rawl’s Veil of Ignorance?

Answer 41

Don’t let economic status interfere with your well-being.

Make the bottom as high as possible.

Question 42

What is John Stuart Mill’s theory? (middle)

Answer 42

Wants a large middle class.

Protection of land, labor; labor legislation was needed.

Need for unions to fight owners; way of breaking down these barriers.

Most happiness happens in middle class; satisfaction with life, most freedom.

Biggest economic population in middle class.

Not OK with luck of birth, trade should be open and free, people should be happy, little government.

Question 43

What is Monetary Loss?

Answer 43

Things lose value over time.

Ex: Expensive car loses value over time. (Mill)

Question 44

What is Marginal increase of pleasure?

Answer 44

Car story; the more you have, the less meaning meeting your essential needs. (Mill)

Question 45

Utilitarianism embraces what two principles?

Answer 45

Principle of equality: one should give equal consideration to the well-being of all affected parties in deciding what to do

Principle of utility: one should seek to maximize well-being

Question 46

What is a Deontological Theory?

Answer 46

Action X is moral/good/right/acceptable not by Action X creating a good result/consequences, but by some other factor.
(not about result, it’s about action)
Ex: could be laws

Question 47

What is the name of the book and who are the authors of the book we read in class?

Answer 47

Moral Issues in Business, 13th Edition
William H. Shaw
Vincent Barry