Business Ethical Lapses

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses that the business world is lapsing into a state where the question of maintaining certain ethics in all the numerous business transactions is being lost, particularly in the area of price-fixing, overcharging, domestic and foreign bribes, fraud and patent infringements. The author points out that most business leaders recognize that ethics in business must be given a great importance and are setting up ethical codes of conduct, which the employees, starting with the top echelons, are expected to follow. The paper relates that the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which creates severe penalties for the falsification of records and other such corporate crimes, has proven to be a very effective tool in the controlling of white collar or corporate crimes.

From the Paper:

"'Freddie Mac' is a corporation owned by stockholders and is responsible for the supply of a continuous fund for mortgage lenders. It was in June 2003 that the President and Chief Operating Officer of the Company, David Glenn was fired, after which event his Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Leland Brendsel, and the Chief Financial Officer, Vaughn Clarke submitted their resignations. Freddie Mac has been met with stiff opposition when it attempted to pay off the two executives who resigned in the middle of the accounting scandal, the purpose being that the share prices would not fall drastically. While Clarke has been allowed to resign with $1 million in compensation, Brendsel has been offered $53.7 million as compensation, even though it came to light that the two top executives had been involved in smoothing out earnings, and in accounting violations."

More papers on Business Ethical Lapses:

• Case Study # 113936 : "Ethics at Arthur Andersen"
• Analytical Essay # 133908 : "Management Planning and Ethics"
• Research Paper # 86670 : "The Enron Debacle"

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