Ethics Vs Profits
The intention of this essay is to explore the issues surrounding research carried out by Nottingham University. The research has suggested that students lose their morals after returning from working in business. In this essay I am trying to find out why this is.
I think that everybody starts out with their own opinions or views on how to judge ethics. For some religions, cultures or age groups the view has a major difference. In business I think it is different again, surely the whole point of being in business is to try to make your business as successful as possible? And the way that business is measured as successful is usually in the way of its profits. But if the public were to disagree with a company’s ethics, would it affect their profits?
In my opinion, this quote from Ambrose Bierce says a lot about the way businesses pass the blame
“Corporation, n., An ingenious device for obtaining profit without individual responsibility.” (Ambrose Bierce, 1906)
I had a look for examples of business practising immoral behaviour. When I started my research I was looking for the actual manager, being the person to blame for the immorals. I found that it was very hard to get one single name or one person who was taking the blame.
My first thoughts are that the Nottingham university students are following the example of businesses we see as successful. But when we look closer at how the businesses made their profits, lots of them have sacrificed their morals in order to make money. So are we just following in their footsteps, knowing that the easiest way to become successful is to abandon our morals?
One of the first companies I came across was ‘Nestle’. Nestle is a worldwide company that has thousands of products though it is mainly known for its breakfast cereals and coffee. Two years ago, there was a huge boycott against nestle for their breast milk sales in Africa. Nestle owns over 50% of the worlds breast milk substitute market and most of its products are sold in third world countries. It started by nestle promoting their products by giving away free samples to struggling mothers. In promotional advertising in these countries nestle was pushing the idea that twins and premature babies need to have breast milk substitute as they are unable to breastfeed. Also, a lot of their instructions or health warnings are...