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Business Law, Public Responsibility, and Ethics Commons™
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- Compensation (7)
- Justice (6)
- Desert (5)
- Pay (5)
- Democracy (4)
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- Business ethics (3)
- Markets (3)
- Agreement (2)
- Authority (2)
- Capitalism (2)
- Corporate social responsibility (2)
- Employees (2)
- McMahon (2)
- Political CSR (2)
- Political philosophy (2)
- Rawls (2)
- Accountability (1)
- Advertising (1)
- Autonomy (1)
- Brennan and Jaworski (1)
- Ceo (1)
- Ceo compensation (1)
- Commitment (1)
- Compensation; justice; pay; secrecy; transparency (1)
- Consumer advertising (1)
- Corporate activity in the digital age (1)
- Corporate governance (1)
- Creepers (1)
- Deception (1)
- Deception; homeopathy; moral limits of markets (1)
Articles 1 - 25 of 25
Full-Text Articles in Business Law, Public Responsibility, and Ethics
Against The Sale Of Homeopathy (And Other Ineffective Medicines), Jeffrey Moriarty
Against The Sale Of Homeopathy (And Other Ineffective Medicines), Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
Consumers spend billions of dollars per year on homeopathic products. But there is powerful evidence that these products don’t work, i.e., they are not medically effective. Should homeopathic products be for sale? I give reason for thinking that the answer is ‘no.’ It has been suggested that the sale of homeopathic products involves deception. This might be so in some cases, but the problem is simpler: it is that these products don’t do what people buy them to do. More precisely, homeopathic products don’t meet the “desire-satisfaction condition,” according to which products for sale in markets should satisfy the desires …
On The Ethics Of Selling Psychic Services, Jeffrey Moriarty
On The Ethics Of Selling Psychic Services, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
In many places, it is possible to buy psychic services, including tarot card, palm, and mediumship readings. Yet we have powerful evidence that psychic abilities do not exist. This paper asks whether psychic services should be for sale. I begin by considering whether psychics deceive or mislead buyers. Next, I consider a harm-based argument against the sale of psychic services. Finally, I consider an argument in favor of their sale that appeals to expressive considerations. I conclude with a tentative policy recommendation: the sale of psychic services should be permitted. This is so even though much of the money spent …
What's In A Wage? A New Approach To The Justification Of Pay, Jeffrey Moriarty
What's In A Wage? A New Approach To The Justification Of Pay, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
In this address, I distinguish and explore three conceptions of wages. A wage is a reward, given in recognition of the performance of a valued task. It is also an incentive: a way to entice workers to take and keep jobs, and to motivate them to work hard. Finally, a wage is a price of labor, and like all prices, conveys valuable information about relative scarcity. I show that each conception of wages has its own normative logic, or appropriate justification, and these logics can come apart. This explains some of the debate about wages and makes the project of …
On The Origin, Content, And Relevance Of The Market Failures Approach, Jeffrey Moriarty
On The Origin, Content, And Relevance Of The Market Failures Approach, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
The view of business ethics that Christopher McMahon calls the “implicit morality of the market” and Joseph Heath calls the “market failures approach” has received a significant amount of recent attention. The idea of this view is that we can derive an ethics for market participants by thinking about the “point” of market activity, and asking what the world would have to be like for this point to be realized. While this view has been much-discussed, it is still not well-understood. This paper seeks to remedy this problem. I begin by showing, against some recent commentators, that McMahon’s view and …
Against Pay Secrecy, Jeffrey Moriarty
Against Pay Secrecy, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
Many firms keep pay secret. They do not make information about what their employees are paid available inside or outside of the firm, i.e., to other employees or to the public at large. Indeed, many firms discourage their employees from, or sanction them for, disclosing their pay. Against this, I argue that there are good moral reasons for firms to be transparent about pay. Pay transparency prevents injustice, promotes autonomy, and increases efficiency. After presenting the positive case for pay transparency, I defend it against objections, including the most common reasons firms give for keeping pay secret.
Risky Pay And The Financial Crisis: Who's Responsible?, Jeffrey Moriarty
Risky Pay And The Financial Crisis: Who's Responsible?, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
According to an existing “environmental” narrative, the financial crisis of 2007-2009 was due in part to executive compensation packages in the financial services industry that incentivized excessive risk-taking. Also according to this narrative, those who have a duty to protect society – principally, government regulators, but also firms themselves – are open to blame for how executives were paid, and must take steps to change executive compensation. This narrative is important but incomplete. I offer a supplementary “agential” narrative. According to this narrative, executives are open to blame for the financial crisis for taking socially excessive risks. Moreover, since executives …
Accountable To Whom? Rethinking The Role Of Corporations In Political Csr, Jeffrey Moriarty, Waheed Hussain
Accountable To Whom? Rethinking The Role Of Corporations In Political Csr, Jeffrey Moriarty, Waheed Hussain
Philosophy Faculty Publications
According to Palazzo and Scherer, the changing role of business corporations in society requires that we take new measures to integrate these organizations into society-wide processes of democratic governance. We argue that their model of integration has a fundamental problem. Instead of treating business corporations as agents that must be held accountable to the democratic reasoning of affected parties, it treats corporations as agents who can hold others accountable. In our terminology, it treats business corporations as “supervising authorities” rather than “functionaries.” The result is that Palazzo and Scherer’s model does not actually address the democratic deficit that it is …
Wanted: Positive Arguments For Markets, Jeffrey Moriarty
Wanted: Positive Arguments For Markets, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
Many people believe that some things, like kidneys or sex, should not be for sale. Let us call these things “contested commodities.” Against this, Brennan and Jaworksi defend “markets without limits” (hereafter: MwL). According to this thesis: “If you may do it for free, you may do it for money.” Since we can give away our kidneys for free and have sex for free, we should be able to do these things for money. Brennan and Jaworksi deftly blend rigorous philosophical argument with the latest research in social science to counter some of the most prominent against commodification. But, I …
Is 'Equal Pay For Equal Work' Merely A Principle Of Nondiscrimination?, Jeffrey Moriarty
Is 'Equal Pay For Equal Work' Merely A Principle Of Nondiscrimination?, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
Should people who perform equal work receive equal pay? Most would say ‘yes’, at least insofar as this question is understood to be asking whether employers should be permitted to discriminate against employees on the basis of race or sex. But suppose the employees belong to all of the same traditionally protected groups. Is (what I call) nondiscriminatory unequal pay for equal work wrong? Drawing an analogy with price discrimination, I argue that it is not intrinsically wrong, but it can be deceptive, in which case it is wrong.
Lurkers, Creepers, And Virtuous Interactivity: From Property Rights To Consent To Care As A Conceptual Basis For Privacy Concerns And Information Ethics, D. E. Wittkower
Lurkers, Creepers, And Virtuous Interactivity: From Property Rights To Consent To Care As A Conceptual Basis For Privacy Concerns And Information Ethics, D. E. Wittkower
Philosophy Faculty Publications
Exchange of personal information online is usually conceptualized according to an economic model that treats personal information as data owned by the persons these data are ‘about.’ This leads to a distinct set of concerns having to do with data ownership, data mining, profits, and exploitation, which do not closely correspond to the concerns about privacy that people actually have. A post-phenomenological perspective, oriented by feminist ethics of care, urges us to figure out how privacy concerns arrive in fundamentally human contexts and to speak to that, rather than trying to convince people to care about privacy as it is …
Compensation Ethics And Organizational Commitment, Jeffrey Moriarty
Compensation Ethics And Organizational Commitment, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
If an employee is committed to his firm – if he is “attached” or “bound” to it – then his firm may be able to obtain a discount on his labor. This paper asks: Is it wrong for firms to do so? If we understand just or fair pay solely in terms of voluntary agreements between employers and employees, the answer seems to be ‘no’. Against this, I argue that, in some cases, it is ‘yes’. In particular, it is wrong for firms to try to obtain discounts on their committed employees’ labor when their employees reasonably expect that they …
The Connection Between Stakeholder Theory And Stakeholder Democracy: An Excavation And Defense, Jeffrey Moriarty
The Connection Between Stakeholder Theory And Stakeholder Democracy: An Excavation And Defense, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
In early writings, stakeholder theorists supported giving all stakeholders formal, binding control over the corporation, in particular, over its board of directors. In recent writings, however, they claim that stakeholder theory does not require changing the current structure of corporate governance and further claim to be “agnostic” about the value of doing so. This article’s purpose is to highlight this shift and to argue that it is a mistake. It argues that, for instrumental reasons, stakeholder theorists should support giving all stakeholders control over the corporation, in the form of control over its board. That is, stakeholder theorists should support …
Corporations, The Democratic Deficit, And Voting, Jeffrey Moriarty
Corporations, The Democratic Deficit, And Voting, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
Many writers argue that a “democratic deficit” is created when private actors such as corporations take on state functions. The problem, it is said, is that the course of public life is being shaped by agents who are not accountable to the public. We evaluate this claim and consider what should be done about it. We focus in particular on a recent attempt, put forward principally by Palazzo and Scherer, to address the democracy deficit by “democratizing” corporations. We argue that their proposal, while promising, has a significant defect. We then propose a remedy for this defect. In sum, our …
Justice In Compensation: A Defense, Jeffrey Moriarty
Justice In Compensation: A Defense, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
Business ethicists have written much about ethical issues in employment. Except for a handful of articles on the very high pay of chief executive officers and the very low pay of workers in overseas sweatshops, however, little has been written about the ethics of compensation. This is prima facie strange. Workers care about their pay, and they think about it in normative terms. This article's purpose is to consider whether business ethicists' neglect of the normative aspects of compensation is justified. I examine several possible justifications for neglecting compensation and show that they fail. What remains is a case for …
Consuming Direct-To-Consumer Genetic Tests: The Role Of Genetic Literacy And Knowledge Calibration, Yvette E. Pearson, Yuping Liu-Thompkins
Consuming Direct-To-Consumer Genetic Tests: The Role Of Genetic Literacy And Knowledge Calibration, Yvette E. Pearson, Yuping Liu-Thompkins
Philosophy Faculty Publications
As direct-to-consumer marketing of medical genetic tests grows in popularity, there is an increasing need to better understand the ethical and public policy implications of such products. The complexity of genetic tests raises serious concerns about whether consumers possess the knowledge to make sound decisions about their use. This research examines the effects of educational intervention and feedback on consumers' genetic literacy and calibration -- the gap between consumers' actual knowledge and how much they think they know. The authors find that consumers' genetic knowledge was generally low and that people tended to underestimate their knowledge level. Furthermore, consumers' perceived …
Does Distributive Justice Pay? Sternberg’S Compensation Ethics, Jeffrey Moriarty
Does Distributive Justice Pay? Sternberg’S Compensation Ethics, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
Compensation has received a great deal of attention from social scientists. Characteristically, they have been concerned with the causes and effects of various compensation schemes. By contrast, few theorists have addressed the normative aspects of compensation. An exception is Elaine Sternberg, who offers in Just Business a comprehensive theory of compensation ethics. This paper critically examines her theory, and argues that the justification she gives for it fails. Its failure is instructive, however. The main argument Sternberg gives for her theory points in the direction of a different one. This, in turns, helps us to see what a justification of …
Business Ethics And (Or As) Political Philosophy, Jeffrey Moriarty, Wayne Norman, Joseph Heath
Business Ethics And (Or As) Political Philosophy, Jeffrey Moriarty, Wayne Norman, Joseph Heath
Philosophy Faculty Publications
There is considerable overlap between the interests of business ethicists and those of political philosophers. Questions about the moral justifiability of the capitalist system, the basis of property rights, and the problem of inequality in the distribution of income have been of central importance in both fields. However, political philosophers have developed, especially over the past four decades, a set of tools and concepts for addressing these questions that are in many ways quite distinctive. Most business ethicists, on the other hand, consider their field to be primarily a domain of applied ethics, and so adopt methods and conceptual frameworks …
Participation In The Workplace: Are Employees Special?, Jeffrey Moriarty
Participation In The Workplace: Are Employees Special?, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
I consider two influential arguments for employee participation in firm decision making: what I call the “interest protection argument” and the “autonomy argument.” I argue that the case for granting participation rights to some other stakeholders, such as suppliers and community members, is at least as strong, according to the reasons given in these arguments, as the case for granting them to certain employees. I then consider how proponents of these arguments might modify their arguments, or views, in response to this conclusion.
Rawls, Self-Respect, And The Opportunity For Meaningful Work, Jeffrey Moriarty
Rawls, Self-Respect, And The Opportunity For Meaningful Work, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
In his late work The Law of Peoples, John Rawls identifies the opportunity for meaningful work as a social basis of self-respect. This constitutes a significant shift in his account of self-respect, one that has been so far overlooked. In this paper I examine this shift. I begin by clarifying Rawls’s account of self-respect in A Theory of Justice (hereafter, Theory), then consider some post-Theory developments in it. After exploring the nature of Rawls’s commitment to the opportunity for meaningful work, I ask why he thinks it is a social basis of self-respect. I extract a partial …
How Much Compensation Can Ceos Permissibly Accept?, Jeffrey Moriarty
How Much Compensation Can Ceos Permissibly Accept?, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
Debates about the ethics of executive compensation are dominated by familiar themes. Many writers consider whether the amount of pay CEOs receive is too large – relative to firm performance, foreign CEO pay, or employee pay. Many others consider whether the process by which CEOs are paid is compromised by weak or self-serving boards of directors. This paper examines the issue from a new perspective. I focus on the duties executives themselves have with respect to their own compensation. I argue that CEOs’ fiduciary duties place a moral limit on how much compensation they can accept, and hence seek in …
Deserving Jobs, Deserving Wages, Jeffrey Moriarty
Deserving Jobs, Deserving Wages, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
This chapter applies recent work on desert to two sets of issues in business ethics. The first set of issues concerns who ought to be hired, fired, promoted, and demoted. Call these issues of “job justice.” The second set of issues concerns how much workers, including managers, ought to be paid. Call these issues of “wage justice.” I focus on job and wage justice because considerations of desert play an important, though sometimes tacit, role in discussions of these issues.
Business Ethics: An Overview, Jeffrey Moriarty
Business Ethics: An Overview, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
This essay provides an overview of business ethics. I describe important issues, identify some of the normative considerations animating them, and offer a roadmap of references for those wishing to learn more. I focus on issues in normative business ethics, but discuss briefly the growing body of work in descriptive business ethics. I conclude with a comment on the changing nature of the field.
Mcmahon On Workplace Democracy, Jeffrey Moriarty
Mcmahon On Workplace Democracy, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
This paper offers a sympathetic critique of Christopher McMahon’s Authority and Democracy: A General Theory of Government and Management. Although I find fault with some of his arguments, my goal is not to show that these arguments are irreparable, but to highlight issues that deserve further consideration. After defining some terms, first, I raise an objection to McMahon’s rejection of the moral unity of management (MUM) thesis. Second, I draw attention to his “moralization” of the workplace, and examine the role it plays in his arguments about the relative strengths of the different kinds of authority. Third, I raise …
On The Relevance Of Political Philosophy To Business Ethics, Jeffrey Moriarty
On The Relevance Of Political Philosophy To Business Ethics, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
The central problems of political philosophy (e.g., legitimate authority, distributive justice) mirror the central problems of business ethics. The question naturally arises: should political theories be applied to problems in business ethics? If a version of egalitarianism is the correct theory of justice for states, for example, does it follow that it is the correct theory of justice for businesses? If states should be democratically governed by their citizens, should businesses be democratically managed by their employees? Most theorists who have considered these questions, including John Rawls in Political Liberalism, and Robert Phillips and Joshua Margolis in a 1999 article, …
Do Ceos Get Paid Too Much?, Jeffrey Moriarty
Do Ceos Get Paid Too Much?, Jeffrey Moriarty
Philosophy Faculty Publications
In 2003, CEOs of the 365 largest U.S. corporations were paid on average $8 million, 301 times as much as factory workers. This paper asks whether CEOs get paid too much. Appealing to widely recognized moral values, I distinguish three views of justice in wages: the agreement view, the desert view, and the utility view. I argue that, no matter which view is correct, CEOs get paid too much. I conclude by offering two ways CEO pay might be reduced.