Category: business ethics

A Developing Crisis in Business Ethics, Automation

On By southwerkIn business ethics

i_256A Developing Crisis in Business Ethics, Automation

I predict that automation is going to be the hottest, most critical issue in business ethics in the next few years. It has been an issue in business ethics for the last fifty years. From time to time, it has risen to be a major issue but it has been a long time since it sat on the front burner of the field. Currently, there is more discussion over wage theft, outsourcing and even parental leave then there is over automation. But that is about to change.

In the past, automation was a danger to the employment of low skilled workers. I’m sure you can recall news photos of giant machines performing routine tasks on an assembly line. That is still happening but there is a new phenomenon. Computing power has now become so close to human intelligence that the jobs of those higher on the food chain are now threatened. Technological change is accelerating and more complex jobs are under threat.

Lawyers, Doctors and Professors will all find their jobs under attack in the years to come. All these professions will soon be replaceable in part, and in time, virtually all functions may be assumed by machine. These individuals are long used to being in a privileged position in society. The shock of the loss of prestige, money and most of all, power will produce a crisis in our society not seen since industrialization.

What will a world in which professions become irrelevant look like? How will we measure social class and achievement? Who will make the key decisions in our government?

This crisis will produce a new set of concerns and a new sense of purpose for the field of business ethics. The government, the professions and every kind of business will speak in a cacophony of voices. Each will be trying to make this brave new world conform to their vision. In this critical discussion, those of us who have been trying to makes sense of what is right and wrong for so long and with such limited results, will have a new importance.

James Pilant

When robots take our jobs, humans will be the new 1%. Here’s how to fight back | Michael Belfiore | Comment is free | theguardian.com

Will you be replaced by a machine? There’s nearly a 50-50 chance,according to a recent study by Oxford University researchers who found that 47% of the labor market in the US alone is at risk of being mechanized out of existence. Approximately 702 jobs thus far held by humans are now threatened by non-humans, as we were reminded by a widely shared report on the study this week.

It’s not hard to see why. Advances in robotics and artificial intelligence are bringing robots into more and more workplaces. For example:

  • Autonomous vehicles now in development by just about every major automaker threaten the jobs of truckers and cabbies.
  • TheBaxter robot from Rethink Robotics is designed to work side-by-side with human factory supervisors, learning new tasks on the go – something only human workers could do previously.
  • Robotic surgeons such as those made by Intuitive Surgical and the open-sourceRaven project currently require human surgeons in the loop, but inroads have already been made into giving these machines autonomy as well.
  • Unmanned aerial vehicles – as in, drones – are getting set for integration into the US national airspace next year, potentially replacing the jobs of many human pilots.
  • My profession isn’t immune to robotic outsourcing either. The Quill robotic journalist digests facts from raw data, and spits out fully formed sports and business stories.
  • Oh, and Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk are now backing “a computer that thinks like a person except it doesn’t need to eat or sleep”. So there’s that.

There’s even a robotic burger flipper in the works. The website of Momentum Machines boasts that its slicing, grinding, frying robot can do “everything employees can do except better”, and that it will “democratize access to high-quality food, making it available to the masses”.

via When robots take our jobs, humans will be the new 1%. Here’s how to fight back | Michael Belfiore | Comment is free | theguardian.com.

Belfiore, M. (2014, March 22). When robots take our jobs, humans will be the new 1%. here’s how to fight back. The Guardian, Retrieved from http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/mar/22/robot-jobs-humans-used-to-do-fight-back

From around the web.

From the web site, Coal Cracker Classroom.

http://coalcrackerclassroom.wordpress.com/2011/04/03/why-technology-cant-replace-teachers/

One of the biggest misconceptions about online learning is that it leaves a complete void regarding human interaction and social-emotional learning.  I have to beg to differ, here.  Technology use and online learning can support social and emotional learning when done correctly.  Textbook-like curriculum, delivered via an online interface, is not true, online learning.  It puts far too much prominence on the tool versus the actual learning that should take place.  Those of us in a classroom daily, who do support the use of technology as a tool for learning, know that in order to be successful, we must strike a balance between teaching, learning, and technology.

Nestico, Suzie. Why technology can’t replace teachers, yet. Retrieved from http://coalcrackerclassroom.wordpress.com/2011/04/03/why-technology-cant-replace-teachers/

The Destruction of Arthur Andersen and the Use of DPAs in FCPA Enforcement

On By southwerkIn business ethics4 Comments

I really enjoyed this article. I think my readers will too.

tfoxlaw's avatarFCPA Compliance and Ethics Blog

Arthur AndersenThe debate over the efficiencies of Deferred Prosecution Agreements (DPAs) continued this week with additional criticism of their use. I have argued that DPAs are in a corporation’s interest because they can bring certainty to the conclusion of an enforcement action and allow it to make remedial changes and move forward. However yesterday I came across an article by Larry Katzen, a former partner at Arthur Andersen and author of “And You Thought Accountants were Boring – My Life Inside Arthur Andersen.” Katzen’s piece is entitled “A Business World Massacre – What Can Happen 
When Government Needs a Scapegoat” and it details the destruction of the firm after it’s guilty verdict surrounding the Enron scandal. Katzen articulates the human costs for the total wipeout of the firm and sets out clearly what can happen when a company goes to trial and sustains a guilty verdict. I…

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Women = Terrible Negotiators?

On By southwerkIn business ethics

007-1Women = Terrible Negotiators?

Is this a comforting belief? Does it make you feel better to think that men are just naturally more violent or any of thousands different stereotypes and labels? 

Women are said by the executive director of the Texas Republican Party to be terrible negotiators. You realize this is the one-half of the population that according to science is more verbally skilled than their male counterparts. However, it appears that some individuals believe that a male grunt is superior to the multi-syllabic utterances of the female.

I don’t think so.

For one thing, my personal experience indicates women negotiate quite well. I have a colleague at my college who is something of a verbal Muhammad Ali. I never know where the next verbal impact is coming from.

For another, since Jane Austen, there is firm evidence of female verbal capabilities.

Believing that women are what they are not is very useful if you wish to deny them equal protection under the law. If women are bad negotiators, then what’s the point of all this equal pay nonsense? Obviously, it’s one of those sexually based behaviors that crazed leftists disconnected from reality don’t understand because if they did they would understand that women get what they deserve.

As a business ethics matter, this falls into business beliefs and customs versus or aligned with “traditional” customs. Traditionally women have to be virginal, coy, the powers behind the throne (definitely not on the throne) nurturing, etc. Business wise, those customs have diminished because women have succeeded so well but these ideas are only diminished to an extent. Beliefs in female deficiencies are comforting. They take a host of actions which would be considered wrong or actually evil and transform into “rational” choices. For instance, it’s wrong to deny a woman promotion to CEO but it’s the correct decision if women are just bad negotiators. So, custom, even if it no longer makes any sense or is scientifically ridiculous, can still trump ethics and truth. Business ethics demands rational thinking because if we believe what is convenient, any action can be justified.

We are all comforted at one time or another by irrational beliefs. “It’s always darkest before the dawn.” (No, there is no limit to darkness. It can just keep on getting darker.) There really isn’t as much harm in “darkest before the dawn” as opposed to the more serious claim that women are poor negotiators.  

Here, the harm is obvious. A necessary law to give women equal opportunity to pay is considered unnecessary due to an irrational belief in female weakness and incompetence.

I find women neither weak or incompetent in comparison to men. Women are not terrible negotiators. They don’t get paid less than men by some natural law. They are paid less than men because of past beliefs that won’t die and convenient beliefs that justify unethical actions.

James Pilant

The right’s ideal modern woman: Fiery, independent and easily confused! – Salon.com

Less than 24 hours later, the executive director of the Texas Republican Party agreed that equal pay laws aren’t the answer for today’s women. The real problem, according to Beth Cubriel, is the fact that women are terrible negotiators. Don’t try to get legal recourse once you find out your employer is paying your male colleagues more money for the same work (Texas will fight you on the statute of limitations, anyway). Instead, host a viewing party of “Glengarry Glen Ross” for your friends and absorb the timeless wisdom of “Always be closing” if you want to make a living wage. You can do it, girlfriend! Bootstraps, or whatever! (Cubriel, besides being an apologist for discrimination, is also wrong about women as negotiators.)

via The right’s ideal modern woman: Fiery, independent and easily confused! – Salon.com.

From around the web.

From the web site, Double XX Economy.

http://www.doublexeconomy.com/2013/04/02/individual-choice-poor-negotiating-skills-clever-entrepreneurs-and-the-wage-gap/

The AAUW study shows that young women straight out of school make 82%  of what young men who are otherwise comparable make:  ”just one  year out of college, millennial women are paid 82 cents for every dollar paid to their male peers.  Women are paid less than men even when they do the same work and major in the same field.”  The report shows several possible comparisons, such as hours worked, and the pay gap remains.  The AAUW soberly points out that college girls take out the same huge student loans that boys do, but will have to pay them back with less money.  Sommers brushes the 18% difference aside as miniscule, but actually this is a big gap when all controls have been engaged, the measures are large aggregates (n=15,000 in this case), and the study was done in a place where equal pay for equal work is the law.  Personally, I think it’s shocking, as did the AAUW.

Importantly, other data consistently show the really big effects of gender begin at the moment the women choose to have children.  So, these girls are starting off, at the gate, making 18% less, but this gap will widen, if only from the demands of family.  I say “if only” because there are other influences that depress the wages of women, such as their tendency to forsake out-of-hours client entertaining (we can call this the “lap dance effect”).

Unskilled and destitute are hiring targets for Fukushima cleanup — The New York Times

On By southwerkIn business ethics

Does this give you confidence in the safety of nuclear power?

Melanie's avatarJapan Safety : Nuclear Energy Updates

” NARAHA, Japan — “Out of work? Nowhere to live? Nowhere to go? Nothing to eat?” the online ad reads. “Come to Fukushima.”

That grim posting targeting the destitute, by a company seeking laborers for the ravaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, is one of the starkest indications yet of an increasingly troubled search for workers willing to carry out the hazardous decommissioning at the site.

The plant’s operator, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, known as Tepco, has been shifting its attention away, leaving the complex cleanup to an often badly managed, poorly trained, demoralized and sometimes unskilled work force that has made some dangerous missteps. At the same time, the company is pouring its resources into another plant, Kashiwazaki-Kariwa, that it hopes to restart this year as part of the government’s push to return to nuclear energy three years after the world’s second-worst nuclear disaster. It is a move that…

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From Idea to Reality

On By southwerkIn business ethics

Anything Paul Kiser thinks is a good idea has my backing.

Paul Kiser's avatar3rd From Sol

Our project leader has begun meetings to research and establish a plan for development of a water storage project in Nepal. This project is needed to collect and store water in the rainy season for crops and animals during the dry season. Other aspects of use and scope of this project are pending and will be finalized as the initial research is completed.

If you have any questions about this project or would like to help please contact Narayan Adhikari at 

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An explanation on what is happening with Russia and Ukraine Unrest in 2014

On By southwerkIn business ethics

“Reddit user murder_cheese” wrote the original article.

 

 

In the Pocket of the Lumber Industry

On By southwerkIn business ethics

In the Pocket of the Lumber Industry

Blatant cronyism on a massive unapologetic scale? How do you top this? Do you kiss the industry’s feet?

Well, don’t worry about Tony Abbot. We can be confident that his next campaign will be very well financed.

James Pilant

Wildlife Extra News – Australian PM outrages with anti national parks stance

March 2014: The Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott has declared he will not support the creation of any new national parks in Australia and that the country has quite enough, despite the fact that they cover just four per cent of Australia.

Speaking at the ForestWorks dinner in Canberra Tony Abbott said he was committed to supporting the Tasmanian logging timber industry and that too many of Australia’s forests are “locked up”.

“We have quite enough national parks. We have quite enough locked up forests already. Why should we lock up as some sort of World Heritage sanctuary, country that has been logged, degraded or planted for timber?”

Abbott also reaffirmed his commitment to removing part of Tasmania’s forest from World Heritage listing, made under the forest peace deal. This is the first time a government has ever sought to delist a World Heritage area when its heritage values are still intact. The forest is home to areas, like the Weld, Styx and Upper Florentine Valleys, and the World Heritage Committee has already rigorously assessed these places as being of Outstanding Universal Value to all of us who inhabit the planet.

“Getting that 74,000 hectares out of World Heritage Listing, it’s still going to leave half of Tasmania protected forever,” said Abbott. “But that will be an important sign to you, to Tasmanians, to the world, that we support the timber industry.”

via Wildlife Extra News – Australian PM outrages with anti national parks stance.

Gladiator School?

On By southwerkIn business ethics

The FBI has launched an investigation into the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) over the way it runs an Idaho prison that has such a reputation for violence that inmates dub it “Gladiator School.”

Gladiator School?

If you get lemons make lemonade? If you have an underperforming incompetent private prison, maybe you could get some fairly competent cage fighters out of the deal? After all, you’re not saving any money doing the privatization game. Why not just settle for what meager benefits there are to be had?

James Pilant

FBI investigates Idaho prison run by private corporation | Al Jazeera America

The Nashville, Tenn.-based CCA has operated Idaho’s largest prison for more than a decade, but last year, CCA officials acknowledged it had understaffed the Idaho Correctional Center by thousands of hours in violation of the state contract. CCA also said employees falsified reports to cover up the vacancies. The announcement came after an Associated Press investigation showed CCA sometimes listed guards as working 48 hours straight to meet minimum staffing requirements.

In January, Idaho officials announced the prison may be handed over to state control because of its staffing issues.

This isn’t the first time the CCA, and private prisons in general, have come under fire in Idaho and elsewhere. Rights groups have long held that private prisons are run without sufficient oversight, often leading to increased violence and prisoner maltreatment.

In Idaho, a 2008 state-run study obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union found that there were four times as many prisoner-on-prisoner assaults at the state’s CCA-run prison than at Idaho’s other seven prisons combined.

And a 2010 NPR investigation suggested that CCA won out on state contracts in Arizona because of its close connections to politicians in the state.

Officials and opponents of private prisons have also argued that privately run prisons are inefficient. A 2001 study by the Justice Department, for example, found that “the cost benefits of privatization have not materialized to the extent promised by the private sector.”

Still, despite such findings, the privatization of prisons has continued mostly unimpeded.

via FBI investigates Idaho prison run by private corporation | Al Jazeera America.

Donated Police?

On By southwerkIn business ethics

Donated Police?

So, big business will now donate police for the wealthier parts of town? In twenty years, will we all wait to see if the donations come though for our municipal services from the 1%? So, instead of paying taxes they decide what’s best for the common folk?

Sometimes charitable giving is insulting. In particular when you take a civic duty and turn it into a private employee whose loyalty is not to the public.

James Pilant

Facebook cops are a horrible idea – Salon.com

All of a sudden, Silicon Valley corporations are falling over themselves to be good civic citizens. Last week Google donated $6.5 million to pay for free Muni passes for Bay Area youth and announced a $5 million grant program for San Francisco nonprofits. The latest act of beneficience? Facebook, reports NBC News, is paying for a full-time beat cop for the city of Menlo Park.

“This is a generous gift,” Menlo Park Mayor Ray Mueller told NBC Bay Area before the meeting. “And it’s a way to keep the community safe.” He noted that the contract states the officer will spend most of his or her time near the schools, and not patrolling the campus of Facebook.

I am all for corporations being good citizens of their communities, but private bankrolling of public cops sets a horrible precedent. For starters, it presents obvious conflict-of-interest challenges. How will police departments treat Facebook employees who might be caught in criminal behavior, when their own budget is partially paid for by Facebook? Everyone involved is swearing up and down that nothing of the sort will ever happen, but if this model spreads, there are bound to be abuses.

But much worse is what this news item reveals about the general bankruptcy of our system of government. Menlo Park is a rich town in one of the wealthiest regions of the United States. The median household income is $103,000, which is almost twice California’s median. The median home price is $925,000, more than double California as a whole. If a community like this can’t afford to pay for an adequate police force, then just imagine what’s happening in poorer communities that lack generous tech companies?

via Facebook cops are a horrible idea – Salon.com.

The lights of Fukushima Daiichi by night

On By southwerkIn business ethics

Take a look at the future with nuclear power, a dead zone with no people outside a lighted atomic power plant (that doesn’t work).

nelson311's avatarEVACUATE FUKUSHIMA

LET IT SHINE

The Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, foreground, shines in the darkness on Feb. 18. The city of Iwaki in Fukushima Prefecture, top left, and central Tokyo, stretching from east to west on the horizon, are also seen. (Yusaku Kanagawa)

1689324_10200727962961356_1773136243_n

Seen from an altitude of 13,000 meters at night, the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant shone brightly in a sea of darkness amid the loneliness of the evacuation zone.

The Asahi Shimbun flew its Asuka airplane over the municipalities of Fukushima Prefecture on Feb. 18. The plant was clearly visible because work to deal with the rising volume of contaminated water and to decommission reactors was actively ongoing, even at night.

In stark contrast, near-complete darkness enveloped areas designated as difficult-to-return zones for residents surrounding the plant.

The city of Iwaki in the prefecture and the bright glow of central Tokyo, once the main recipient…

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