Business Ethics – Page 8 – education and deconstruction.com

In the Name of Profit – Bonus Post

This blogger skimmed the ebook, “In the Name of Profit” by multiple co-authors, originally published in 1972. This depressing set of anecdotes on corporate greed simply reminds the reader that there is nothing new under the sun.

One theme is that through the 1950’s and 1960’s, big manufacturers such as Goodrich and General Motors had constructive knowledge that the products they sold were defective. Purchasers had bad experiences, and were seriously injured or were killed by those products. The companies’ attorneys and their employees rationalized that “‘planned obsolescence” meant progress. “But the meaning is clear: ‘Go cheapen the product so we can make more money.” In the case of drug company Richardson-Merrell, the product wasn’t cheapened, but rather, serious side effects were downplayed or hushed up and the results of FDA pre-approval testing were fabricated. Unsurprisingly, the company and its subsidiaries hired top-dollar attorneys skilled at helping businesses weasel out of legal trouble.

Another topic covered was Napalm, whose evolution began at Guadalcanal during WWII. “The Napalm fire bomb was deliberately designed as an indiscriminate terror weapon for mass destruction and death among civilians.” When people in Vietnam were harmed, Dow Chemical’s legal defense was bolstered by the fact that it had received orders by the U.S. Government to make the controversial product.

This ebook also discussed stock manipulation and corporate takeover. SEC laws were shown to be very lax in the 1950’s and 1960’s, as one particular perpetrator did jail time for various securities violations, but after his release, went right back to his old tricks. One Herbert Korholz repeatedly gamed the system with acquisitions. President of the Susquehanna corporation, he was able to bribe directors and officers in taking over another company with a secret tender offer of a share price higher than what was to be offered to the general share-owning public. “Profit-making firms can cut their taxes magnificently by merging with big losers…” One Maurice Schy, an attorney, attempted to make the government aware of Korholz’s unethical, unlawful and disgusting behavior, by filing lawsuits through the years, to no avail. Government officials were mired in conflicts of interest (favorable to Korholz’s interest) and ruled against Schy every time except one; a ruling was pending as this book was being released in 1972. Schy had finally gotten a possible break only because there was another case brought by another party against Korholz’s companies’ illegal activities.

In sum, we human beings are a mixed bag of evolutionary traits; altruism and greed among them. On many occasions, greed wins out, and we never seem to learn from those past occasions.

Confessions of a Surgeon

The Book of the Week is “Confessions of a Surgeon” by Paul A. Ruggieri, M.D., published in 2012.

These days in the United States, with the landscape changing for the worse in some ways in the medical community, all sorts of factors threaten the progression of the livelihood of a surgeon; namely– bad luck, lawsuits, increasing stress and diminishing financial returns. The author details those factors in the context of patient cases he has seen.

The conventional saying about a surgeon’s career is that the first decade is spent learning how to operate; the next, learning when to operate, and the next, learning when not to operate.

With the rapid advancement in imaging technology of late, more and more patients are accidentally learning that they have certain medical conditions. Such incidental findings generate extra worries and expenses, especially if the conditions are life-threatening. The word “cancer” on a medical report automatically stokes a surgeon’s fear of being accused of medical malpractice. The surgeon feels compelled to order more tests for legal protection and containment of medical malpractice insurance costs (which rise even in cases where the surgeon is exonerated) even when there is only a tiny likelihood of malignancy. Yes, the author writes, there are plenty of greedy surgeons who order more tests (or perform unnecessary surgery) just to make more money.

The author is in private practice at a hospital, so he gets all his business through referrals from other medical professionals or patients. Therefore, he is under pressure to “play well with others” in his community, lest he lose business.

“Surgeons frequently have conversations with body parts or organs they are trying to remove. They also have conversations with themselves. It’s a way to blow off steam while your mind scrambled to deal with the unexpected.”

Read the book to learn more about the trials, tribulations and triumphs of people who perform medical operations for a living.

Chasing Chaos

The Book of the Week is “Chasing Chaos: My Decade In and Out of Humanitarian Aid” by Jessica Alexander, published in 2013. This is the career memoir of an aid worker who found her calling in helping refugees of war, natural disasters and anti-government uprisings.

She interviewed the victims, wrote reports on their living conditions, pushed paper, attended meetings and held meetings, among other bureaucratic tasks– doing two-month to seven-month stints in The Sudan, Rwanda, Sri Lanka, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Haiti. “The martyr complex permeated my psyche, and although I desperately needed a break, I felt negligent when I left.”

In Darfur, the author learned of the pitiful situation in education by visiting a “school,” which consisted of a tent, a blackboard, benches and prayer mats. Teachers who had been working without a salary for two months told her that the ratios: of children to teachers was one hundred and fifty to one; children to notebooks was three to one, and children to lesson books was eight to one.

Alexander recounted a bizarre scene in which airport security left a lot to be desired. “The security men were looking at a blank screen. And the metal detector? It wasn’t plugged in. The airport had no power. But they put on a good show anyway…”

In recent years, Hollywood celebrities’ jumping on the international-charity bandwagon has meant a tremendous boost in the flow of money to various humanitarian causes. People have thus acquired the misguided notion that throwing money at the problems in Third-World countries, or a week-long visit to them during spring break to shovel some dirt in an attempt to rebuild, or donating old clothes to their hapless citizens, is actually what they need or want.

Read the book to learn:

why the author became frustrated and felt powerless when she was stateside again, working at the corporate office of a non-governmental organization (NGO; non-profit humanitarian aid group);

how the media do their part to raise awareness of suffering in the world;

and her course of action when she was forced to choose between her career and her life’s romantic subplot (i.e., settling down in a stable lifestyle as a member of a community).

Fake

The Book of the Week is “Fake” by Kenneth Walton, published in 2006. This book’s author tells a suspenseful story about his 2003 eBay activities that were deemed a crime.

A friend who was well-versed in the business, sparked Walton’s passion for hunting for paintings at antique shops, thrift stores and flea markets, and reselling those paintings at a profit on the online auction site. However, as Walton honed his entrepreneurial skills, he got greedy and began to collude with his friend, using deception to make more money.

Read the book to learn of what happened when Walton found himself in serious trouble, and how he realized he could make money honestly through a different pursuit for which he had natural ability, and for which he developed a passion.

Running with the Kenyans

The Book of the Week is “Running with the Kenyans” by Adharanand Finn, published in 2012. This ebook is a personal account detailing the author’s quest to find out why Kenya’s runners have developed a reputation in the past decade for winning so many races around the world.

Finn, an English journalist, moved his family to Kenya for several months to observe firsthand how the Kenyans do what they do. He himself jogs as a hobby, and while there, trained with many world record holders for his first marathon, in Lewa.

Iten is the small town where many Kenyans reside– in one of two major upmarket athletics training camps, where athletes, who get free food and lodging, do nothing but run, eat and sleep. The groups train daily in all kinds of weather, starting at 6 or 7am, braving “…potholes, cows and bicycles.” The camp manager decides who will run in races outside Kenya, and gets a percentage of the monies won.

The author notes that a Kenyan reports his or her age as significantly lower than it really is when signing up for a race. He couldn’t learn the real reason why. Also unexplained, is why, at the time the author was running with the Kenyans, they did not have big-money sponsors, like Adidas or Nike.

Another Kenyan cultural trait– that prompts competence at running from a young age– is that school is usually one to five miles from home, between which the kids run, so as to minimize transportation time. There are neither buses nor chauffeuring parents. At the time of his writing, the author had heard from various sources that Kenyans, counterintuitively, actually had high reverence for the British, who “… had brought civilization to Kenya.” So when Westerners were wearing shoes specially designed for running, the Kenyans thought they should wear them, too. This is in spite of the fact Kenyans run faster barefoot because most of them spend their lives barefoot, growing up on rural subsistence farms, and have won more races barefoot than not.

When Kenyan runners achieve fame and fortune, they return home to a village asking for a piece of them. This becomes a distraction and kills their careers if they, as many of them do, divert time and resources from their hours-long training every day; like, if they want to build a school for their village. This is not necessarily a bad thing– if they make a conscious choice to give back to their community, and they want to retire.

Read the book to learn more about other aspects of Kenyan culture plus other factors conducive to fast running, and how the author fared in his first marathon, before which, helicopters had to scare lions away from the course.

A Death… – Bonus Post

This blogger skimmed the ebook, “A Death in the Lucky Holiday Hotel” by Pin Ho and Wenguang Huang, published in 2013. This is a story whose details get tiresome after a while, about the downfall of two powerful politicians in China in 2012.

One politician was Wang Lijun. To compensate for his lack of a college education, he added laughable lies to his resume, such as the entry for “a master’s degree in business administration through a one-year correspondence education program at something called ‘California University.” This blogger recalls that that was the fictional school attended by the characters on the 1990’s American TV show, “90210.

Wang Lijun also purchased an eMBA from the diploma mill of China Northeastern Finance University. During a ceremony, the president of Beijing University of Post and Telecommunications publicly announced that Wang held a PhD in law. He was frequently called professor, and certain media disseminated propaganda that he was a researcher, author, inventor and fashion designer. His real job was police officer and later, police chief.

In addition to his making myths about himself, Wang used the usual techniques of dictators to amass a tremendous amount of power. Unsurprisingly, “…Wang had gone through fifty-one assistants during his two-year tenure in Chongqing…” He wrongly accused businesses of engaging in organized crime, used illegal surveillance techniques, denied suspects due process in the extreme, and embezzled public funds. You get the picture. Bo Xilai was Wang Lijun’s rival. According to Bo’s intimates, as of March 2012, Bo’s family had larcenously obtained 100 million yuan; in April 2012, that figure was 1 billion yuan.

“Suicide from depression is common among leaders at all levels of the Chinese government” especially when they are “…under investigation on corruption related charges.” Read the book to learn: whether Wang Lijun used this way out, and about the international incident that he staged; what prompted Bo Xilai to act similarly to Richard Nixon in delivering a “Checkers speech;” about the governmental infrastructure in China that provided the means for Wang’s and Bo’s outrageous conduct; and here and there, about Chinese history– such as Mao Tse Tung’s anti-intellectual campaign of May 1966.

The Billionaire’s Apprentice

The Book of the Week is “The Billionaire’s Apprentice” by Anita Raghavan, published in 2013. This ebook describes the investigation into the activities of a few Wall Streeters who were accused of insider trading in the past several years. Most of the accused happened to be of South Asian descent–from Sri Lanka and India.

One concept the book conveys to readers is that it is unknown how many American securities-industry professionals are benefiting from insider trading, but the people in this book just happened to get caught because there was sufficient evidence against them to prompt the SEC, US Attorney’s office and FBI to go after them, rather than other possible offenders. The departments involved included the SEC’s Market Abuse Unit and the Department of Justice’s Securities and Commodities Fraud Task Force in the legal jurisdiction of the Southern District of New York (covering Manhattan and the Bronx, according to the author).

Another concept is that the investigating organizations and the securities industry are staffed with many people who, during their careers, switch allegiances. They might go from being a prosecutor to being a defense attorney, or from brokerage executive to government regulator, or vice versa. In this book the “old boy network” is alive and well. Arguably, conflicts abound.

Read the book to learn, among other extremes, about wiretapping (not the NSA’s), about one of the accused who “had several phones– at least thirteen– and he used them all” and a $30 million legal bill.

Island Practice

The Book of the Week is “Island Practice” by Pam Belluck, published in 2012. This ebook discusses in detail, the life of a doctor who has been practicing general medicine and surgery on Nantucket for decades. He is a colorful character: having no qualms about cursing when providing psychotherapy (without a license); making house calls and treating patients at his own house; allowing patients to pay their bills through bartering; not charging indigent patients at all; treating animals as well; maintaining an extensive collection of operative firearms; occasionally allowing a needy person to live with him, his wife and three kids; and engaging in other offbeat pursuits.

Nantucket, a less-than-fifty-square-mile island in Massachusetts, is a socially isolated summer vacation destination for many wealthy celebrities. However, its year-round residents also need medical care, frequently for three serious tick-borne diseases, on which Dr. Lepore is an expert. When a patient has a life-threatening condition that requires immediate treatment, the doctor has them airlifted by helicopter to a hospital in the Boston area. In times of severe weather when aircraft are not flying, he must try to save the patient himself, by doing a Caesarian section or sewing up a hole in a duodenum in a case of pancreatitis.

The author portrays Dr. Lepore as similar to the fictional TV character Dr. Gregory House in that he is often diagnosing “zebras” (rare medical conditions) rather than “horses” (common ailments) through his intuition and then heroically curing the patient while bucking hospital rules.

Read the book to learn of the doctor’s highly irregular approach to practicing medicine, the difficulties and controversies he and his family have faced through the years, and the precarious future that medical professionals like him face, with the introduction of Obamacare.

As an aside, it appeared that this book’s thesis, stated toward the end, is that Obamacare would force doctors such as Lepore out of business. This blogger thinks that that will not occur. The wealthy will always seek out the best medical care, and pay such doctors under the table if necessary, to obtain it. They will find the loopholes in national healthcare to avoid a bad HMO. They would gladly pay the fine for not signing up for Obamacare because the fine will never be sufficiently high to be a deterrent for making their own private arrangements for medical treatment. A major argument some people– not just the wealthy– have against national healthcare– is that it is unfair to make the healthy people pay the high medical bills of the people who knowingly engage in risky, self-destructive behaviors (smoking; poor eating habits, lack of exercise) that result in preventable medical conditions or that exacerbate certain conditions (cancer, obesity, diabetes, etc.) that require expensive medical care. [By the way, this blogger’s medical bills were $0 last year and have been $0 so far this year (this includes out-of-pocket expenses)– for you curious readers.]

Apologies to My Censor

The Book of the Week is “Apologies to My Censor” by Mitch Moxley, published in 2013. In this ebook, the author, a Canadian journalist, describes the six years he spent in Beijing.

Moxley arrived in Beijing the spring of 2007 to work at an English-language state-owned newspaper. The reporting was limited to upbeat topics. Articles on Taiwan, Tibet or the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre contained propaganda rather than true statements. Ironically however, in everyday conversation, the Chinese people were brutally honest.

Many foreigners– who were paid triple the Chinese natives– worked at the paper at the time. In order for any native to prevail at a journalism career, joining the Communist Party was mandatory. This involved attending Party conferences on some weekends. For a short while, the author played basketball with his colleagues. When the Chinese players took a breather, they smoked courtside.

While in China, Moxley did various kinds of labor, more than just journalism. Most were unfulfilling for him. He engaged in the lucrative trades of: reading while having his voice recorded for the creation of English-language education-materials; posing as a foreign businessman working for a Chinese company for public relations purposes; and acting, dancing or singing in various videos to be broadcasted on the internet or TV.

Read the book to learn about the author’s life in Beijing– his workplace, living quarters, recreation, social life and romantic pursuits, and half-hearted attempts to learn Chinese– and his ambivalence about returning to Toronto.

The Big Rich – Bonus Post

“The Big Rich” by Bryan Burrough, published in 2009, is a long ebook that details the lives and times of the four Texas families who became extremely wealthy Americans from the oil business in the first half of the twentieth century. “They… became the country’s first shirt-sleeve billionaires… accumulated every toy of their age…” including lavish residences, private jets, boats, fancy cars and politicians (when they got into politics).

The editing of this book is a bit sloppy in spots. Nevertheless, according to this book, oil was first discovered in Texas in a well that was later named Spindletop in Beaumont, around 1901. The abundant quantity of oil found there caused a price drop that prompted a conversion from coal to oil among railroads and steamship companies. Suddenly, thousands of people sought to get rich quickly from oil, similar to the way people wanted in on the California Gold Rush. The nineteen teens saw a proliferation of automobiles requiring oil.

Read the book to learn all the details about the people, places, politics and peripheral issues (such as professional sports) associated with the oil industry in Texas over the next ten decades.