Author: southwerk

I am a 53 year old teacher. I have double major in Speech and Criminal Justice resulting in a Bachelor's degree from Northeastern State University in Oklahoma and a law degree.

Experimenting with Thought Experiments (via Grand Strategy: The View from Oregon)

On By southwerkIn business ethics, Capitalism, ethics

This is great, quite a coincidence in fact. I have been reading a lot of philosophy lately and had been reading, I believe, it was Rortybomb who had an interesting discussion of Rawls and the “veil of ignorance.” Before that, I had been watching videos about Aristotle which was then beefed up by a very kind comment by The Ethics Sage, Steven Mintz. So, I go to see what’s cooking at Grand Strategy: The View from Oregon, and it’s an essay quoting Rawls and comparing his writing to Aristotle’s. Of course, it is thoughtful and in depth as all of his work.

I’m just grateful. This is keeping me on the path. Thanks!

James Pilant

Experimenting with Thought Experiments Saturday Yesterday in Risk Management: A Personal View I asked the question, in relation to John Rawls' thought experiment involving choosing a just society from behind a veil of ignorance, "How would Aristotle’s Great Souled Man judge a society from behind a veil of ignorance?" Here is Rawls' original formulation of his thought experiment: "…no one knows his place in society, his class position or social status, nor does anyone know his fortun … Read More

via Grand Strategy: The View from Oregon

Have You Been Charged Mystery Fees Through Your Phone Bill? It’s Called Cramming.

On By southwerkIn ethics

From Huffington Post –

The Senate Commerce Committee is investigating several little-known companies for charging consumers mystery fees through their phone bills in a practice known as cramming.

Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John D. Rockefeller, D-W. Va., sent letters to three companies Friday asking them to explain unauthorized charges that they or affiliates have placed on landline phone bills. Those charges, Rockefeller said, were often for services that are available for free online, such as e-mail, or are already bundled with regular phone service, such as voice mail.

Just when I think I have all the different scams figured out, there is another one. I can’t even figure out (the committee is asking) how they would get my data from my cell phone company? Are they selling me out? Do they get a cut? I hope not.

If you read the article these companies appear to independent entities set up for the purpose of “cramming,” so I can’t complain about a company failure of business ethics. They didn’t have any to begin with. This is unconscionable behavior, the kind the law should be upset about. Instead we have a Senate Committee sending them a letter.

I hope something comes of it.

James Pilant

A 12 Cent Credit Card Fee?

On By southwerkIn business ethics, Capitalism, Corporate Social Responsibility, ethics, Philosophy of Business

From the Houston Chronicle –

A proposed cap on the fees that banks charge for debit card transactions would substantially reduce the cost for businesses. But it’s started a death watch for debit card rewards and renewed predictions that free checking is done for.

At issue is who will ultimately benefit from the savings? The Federal Reserve’s proposal to cap these fees, officially known as interchange fees, at 12 cents per transaction would enable retailers to pass on annual savings of $10 billion to $13 billion to consumers. But banks and card networks maintain that retailers will pocket the savings. This would leave consumers to bear the brunt of the new law through higher costs for banking and reduced rewards programs.

In releasing its proposal Thursday, Fed staff members said they found the cost to banks for processing is between 7 cents and 12 cents per transaction. Yet every time a customer swipes a debit card, the average fee is 44 cents.

The banks are making out like bandits and then telling us it’s for our benefit. I always worry when someone says they are doing something for my own good. I can’t help but feel that someone is going to hit me.

Banks love to bill as if some dedicated employee was carefulling examining the transaction, which was undoubtedly true in 1947. The actual current circumstances is a high speed computer instantly calculating the transaction.

We can adjust for the times.

James Pilant

Commerce Department Calls For Internet Privacy!

On By southwerkIn business ethics, Corporate Social Responsibility, ethics, Philosophy of Business

From the Star Tribune –

The Commerce Department is calling for the creation of a “privacy bill of rights” for Internet users to set ground rules for companies that collect consumer data online and use that information for marketing and other purposes.

The proposal, outlined in a report Thursday, is intended to address growing unease about the vast amounts of personal information that companies are scooping up on the Internet — from Web browsing habits to smart phone locations to Facebook preferences. That data is often mined to target advertising.

The new report is intended to guide lawmakers, industry and a White House group looking at the issues surrounding Internet privacy.

Absolutely necessary.

There’s enough tracking software on my computer to slow it down (and I play Fallout 3, that means power). We don’t even know who these people are. Who is playing with our data? Who’s selling it? And for what purpose? Scammers? Is is the Russian Mafia, the Communist Chinese or the North Koreans operating in the only area where their technology is equal to the West (there might be another exception for counterfeiting, they’re really good at that)?

This proposal is important and I hope something comes of it.

James Pilant

Did You Know My Religion Was Reform Judaism?

On By southwerkIn business ethics, Capitalism, ethics

Did you know that I was a Reform Jew?

Well, you can forget it as quick as you learned it. I am a Methodist, but Reform Jew is what my Facebook Profile says.

I don’t want people who I don’t know anything about to have access to my actual data. Besides Reform Judaism sounds kind of neat.

(I considered Islam, but I didn’t want to wait an extra couple of hours to board a plane.)

Loren Steffy writes about internet privacy and specifically about Facebook privacy in a recent column.
From the Column –

We’ve allowed self-indulgence and technology to override common sense when it comes to what we share with the world.

A birth date and a name can yield a driver’s license number and address in about 30 seconds. From there, it’s relatively easy to get a Social Security number, a list of legal judgments or convictions, information on gun permits, pilot licenses and voter registration, among other things.

You can, of course, just put the month and a day of your birth, but profile photos and school information can make it possible to guess the year.

Either way, it may be enough information to, say, fill out a credit card application in your name. For minors, this is particularly dangerous because identity theft can go undetected until they’re old enough to establish credit, and by then their credit is already ruined.

Facebook, of course, isn’t the culprit. It simply provides the platform from which we feel a need to talk about ourselves. Much of the same information can be found elsewhere with a little effort, of course. Facebook merely wraps it in a tidy package for lazy online scofflaws.

Facebook has added privacy controls, but the typical user doesn’t really know who all their friends are, or how much they value the friendship. Would all your “friends” turn down, say, $50, to let a someone have a look at your profile?

Chinese Ghost Cities

On By southwerkIn ethics, Government Failure

From Business Insider –

The hottest market in the hottest economy in the world is Chinese real estate. The big question is how vulnerable is this market to a crash.
One red flag is the vast number of vacant homes spread through China, by some estimates up to 64 million vacant homes.
We’ve tracked down satellite photos of these unnerving places, based on a report from Forensic Asia Limited. They call it a clear sign of a bubble: “There’s city after city full of empty streets and vast government buildings, some in the most inhospitable locations. It is the modern equivalent of building pyramids. With 20 new cities being built every year, we hope to be able to expand our list going forward.”

I am indebted to Luke H. Lee for bringing this story to my attention.

I am often told how China will be the next superpower. I point out the numerous dangerous border situations, the rampant corruption, and the inherent inefficiency of a communist government. Yet, I fail to make a dent. The conventional wisdom is too strong.

This evidence is hard to dismiss. The United States was considered to be foolish when there were unoccupied developments, housing and commercial, but cities? That’s a disaster. And it’s ongoing.

James Pilant

Andrew Comments On “Will Tax Cuts Spur the Economy? (via The Ethics Sage)”

On By southwerkIn business ethics, Capitalism, Government Failure2 Comments

I think the problem is that the government doesn’t know HOW to PROPERLY regulate the economy to help spur growth. Sometimes the government just needs to learn when to back off. Cutting taxes isn’t going to do anything anymore. You cant really lower interest rates because they are practically zero as is.

What about letting loose of the arbitrary reins of control the government has hold of. For instance, legalize marijuana. The drug, in of itself, is no worse than tobacco and alcohol. Legalization would do many things. It would open up an entirely new market to legitimate tax paying citizens. It would create thousands of jobs. Portugal has had great success with it. They also saw a substantial decrease in the consumption of hard drugs after they legalized marijuana.

Thats just one example of how we can get the economy going again. We just need to reevaluate why we make certain things illegal or off limits. If there is no good reason for it, then legalize it, tax it, and regulate it. We cant try and create a fake demand like FDR did in the New Deal. We just need to satisfy actual demands.

Jayaraman Rajah Iyer Comments On “Who will regret giving insider minnows free lunch?”

On By southwerkIn business ethics, ethics, Philosophy of Business

I am pleased to reproduce my comments I posted at Reuters: It is a case of `Matsanyaya’ matsya means fish nyaya means justice, where big fish swallows the smaller ones. I agree with you, Hedge Fund managers may feel lucky this time but they are always vulnerable, waiting for the tsunami with patience. But please address the issue direct – what’s wrong in getting the insider information and what’s the need for insider probe? The system provides for such misfeasance. It is like match fixing. The team member is bribed to act in a manner the fixer walks away with the loot in a speculative market.

What’s the solution? Fix the system. Correct the situation at the core corporate level. We allow legally loopholes within a balance sheet and then yell about the misuse. It has happened before and continues to happen i.e. Intangible Asset, an oxymoron. This in my opinion singly sucked all the money in the banking system to unproductive enterprises creating a bubble of speculative transactions. Hedge Funds is the outcome of the intangible asset enterprise stoking the fire of greed.

IASB-IFRS is repeating the same error, like the person who sold Eiffel Tower twice, to introduce Hedge Accounting. Please see Exposure Draft Hedge Accounting http://wp.me/p18MVb-5u and comment upon it directly to IASB.

My suggestion is to bring the inside information out, twice over to the public arena by Governance Reporting on a real-time monitoring basis identifying the critical areas: Please see HACCP of Governance http://wp.me/p18MVb-5i and other areas I have covered in my blog.

I do not know whether giving reference to my blog would be considered by Reuters as infringing the House Rules. If so, please do not hesitate to advice me for my knowledge.

Jayaraman Rajah Iyer

“Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.” (via homophilosophicus)

On By southwerkIn Uncategorized3 Comments

Read this paragraph –

Death is cruel injustice. It has opened the vaults of endless unanswered questions in a world of agony and seeming emptiness. The rising of the sun offers no absolution; it offers little consolation, but uninvited and often unwelcome the sun does rise. Every day it rises and presents new moments and gifts. We walk from the graves and the questions of the dead, and out through the gates of the necropolises into the land of the living. At times it seems cruel that we are made to live among the living and leaving our loved ones behind, but they are not truly gone. They live on; in us and in their rest. Why do we seek the living among the dead? He is risen, and this causes us to tremble.

That is eloquence. Now go read the rest.

James Pilant

"Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn." At Newbridge cemetery, in the County of Kildare, where in an unmarked grave on common ground lies the mortal remains of Sergeant Henry Ramage V.C. (1827-1858). On his posthumous citation for the Victoria Cross it was written of him, "On 25 October 1854, at the Battle of Balaclava, Sergeant Ramage galloped to the assistance of Private McPherson, also of the 2nd Dragoons, when he saw that he was surrounded by seven Russians. By his gallantry, he di … Read More

via homophilosophicus

Risk Management: A Personal View (via Grand Strategy: The View from Oregon)

On By southwerkIn Capitalism

Reading Grand Strategy: The View from Oregon is never dull. Now, I warn you this author does not believe in brief articles, when he tackles a subject he intends to throttle and utterly subdue it. This is a fine article on risk mangement. Enjoy!

James Pilant

Risk Management: A Personal View Friday I have never thought of myself as a person who takes risks. On the contrary, I view my actions as cautious and calculated, since I am not likely to engage in some activity until I judge it to be a sure thing. But others see things otherwise. Some years ago I was talking to a financial adviser and I was taken up … Read More

via Grand Strategy: The View from Oregon