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Penn State News: “Gift will create Tarriff Center for Business Ethics and Social Responsibility”

Undoubtedly businesses are profit driven. But I believe I saw recently that a majority of execs no longer accept that the sole driver of their management relationship is shareholder value. So something that is probably a good thing is happening at the biz schools. Indeed, if you don't have something offsetting the usual business school mantra of turning everything into a simple math problem, you will produce more Martin Shkrelis. Indeed, Shkreli didn't go to b-school, let alone college. And of course, Heather Bresch and B-school is it's own story.

Discussed that report at work. Consensus was 1) it's mainly PR and 2) that it will last until those execs miss their first earnings target and their stock price gets punished, with the caveat that some of them are stubborn so it might take a little longer.
 
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Undoubtedly businesses are profit driven. But I believe I saw recently that a majority of execs no longer accept that the sole driver of their management relationship is shareholder value. So something that is probably a good thing is happening at the biz schools. Indeed, if you don't have something offsetting the usual business school mantra of turning everything into a simple math problem, you will produce more Martin Shkrelis. Indeed, Shkreli didn't go to b-school, let alone college.

Eh, I always viewed stuff like that as goodwill statements. We value our employees, the environment, etc. Everything has a dollar value associated with it. I am reminded of an incident almost 25 years ago, a corporate engineer told me he had once met with an actuary for the company's insurance provider. The engineer's task was to justify the costs of safety programs for the higher ups. The actuary said if you kill someone expect to pay about $3MM, if you merely incapacitate them for life its $6MM. We made a few jokes about the matter, but the lesson was that even the most basic of "principles" had to have a cost associated to it.
 
Eh, I always viewed stuff like that as goodwill statements. We value our employees, the environment, etc. Everything has a dollar value associated with it. I am reminded of an incident almost 25 years ago, a corporate engineer told me he had once met with an actuary for the company's insurance provider. The engineer's task was to justify the costs of safety programs for the higher ups. The actuary said if you kill someone expect to pay about $3MM, if you merely incapacitate them for life its $6MM. We made a few jokes about the matter, but the lesson was that even the most basic of "principles" had to have a cost associated to it.
Actuaries are such hopeless romantics.
 
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Not being aware doesn't work as a defense in court related matters. To pretend that a corporate lawyer won't defend the company over an employee is naive. I've watched them do it first hand, and I sat in a meeting where the hr manager made it abundantly clear who the attorney represented, and that if anyone else found themselves caught up in legal matters that they should get their own counsel. So, would you like to know what you are responsible for or not?
1. I am very much pro-ethics training, whether at work or at b-school. When I do internal investigations, I have a two-axis system for evaluating witnesses, with the x-axis being smart/stupid, and the y-axis being good/evil. It is remarkable the number of people (including ignorant people) who still show up in the stupid box.
2. Most training at work - particularly of the online variety -- is profoundly bad at really dealing with ethical decisionmaking. Yeah, you get a recitation of applicable laws, and hopefully enough that you think about them, but it's not really gonna help you identify anything but the most obvious noncompliance. It's a check the box exercise so the company can say it has a compliance program, so that it can argue for reduced corporate settlements if something goes sideways.
3. Good training should always highlight the potential consequences of noncompliance. But in the case of your certification, it sounds a little amateurish. The company itself generally has little to say regarding whether any employee will be criminally liable for anything.
 
true- but an ethical industry would have no need to buy so many politicians

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is far and away the biggest lobbying group in America - and it's not close; I wouldn't call them evil. If you want to look at why pharmaceutical prices are high, know that a) you're paying for every drug that fails and b) there are a lot more 'hands in the honeypot' when it comes to cost drivers in America. In other countries with single payer systems, the companies negotiate directly with one entity - the government. Here, you have insurance companies, health care providers, Medicare, Medicaid, physicians, hospitals, pharmacists, etc. - everyone wants a cut.
 
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Yes, lobbying and political contributions should be completely banned.
Restricting the rights of private citizens is not the answer.

One can not buy what is not for sale. The only way to fix the problem is to take power away from Washington and give it back to the states where it originated. They can neither print money, nor run deficits.

Every time we allow government to expand its involvement in the economy, we create more and more cronysim.
 
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I think this is wonderful!

The first class should be comprised of all current members of the PSU board of trustees and any former members who have served during the past 25 years. In addition, every person who is currently serving in an administrative capacity in any of the bloated ranks say 1 through 7 of all the administrators of the University. Any of these people who fail to earn a grade of 100% should be demoted or fired immediately.

Anyone who wants to serve in any of the positions above should be required to also have passed all the classes with a 100% grade as a condition precedent to their being hired, promoted, or appointed.

Continuing education should be required each year.

The primary case study should be all the administrative decisions made at PSU for the past 20 years.

Remember after Nov. 2011 all of the university employees and bot members were going to have background checks done, and then suddenly the bot was excluded after Dambly's criminal past came to light?
 
Restricting the rights of private citizens is not the answer.

One can not buy what is not for sale. The only way to fix the problem is to take power away from Washington and give it back to the states where it originated. They can neither print money, nor run deficits.

Every time we allow government to expand its involvement in the economy, we create more and more cronysim.

Thank you for that humorous interlude.
 
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true- but an ethical industry would have no need to buy so many politicians
Easy to say but drugs cost a fortune to develop and the government has to approve them and they are the biggest buyer.
 
Aside from raising awareness vav "Spinning"?

Seriously?
Certainly there is reason to be skeptical of such things in action. But the fact remains that these were the results, and they were results that you wouldn't have seen thirty, or twenty, or ten years ago. I suspect that at a minimum, they reflect a recognition of the need to be perceived as walking the walk. And recognizing that need is, as a practical matter, likely to affect behavior at least in an incremental way.
 
It's sad that you find the Bill of Rights humorous. It's even sadder that congress does as well.
You left out the executive. and the judicial.

No one thinks the Ninth Amendment is worth much of anything, nor have they for about 200 years.

In any event, we've been talking about the regulation of interstate commerce. I'm pretty sure the constitution speaks to that.
 
If you had heart problems like I did, you might be more thankful of the pharma industry.
Let’s see, I take 7 different prescription medicines including two for my heart. My annual cost after Medicare and prescription coverage is about $10,000 a year. My wife’s costs are another $4,000.
 
Actually, the antitrust laws have almost nothing to do with price gouging. A legal (patent) monopolist can price like a monopolist. 'Price gouging' generally requires a shortage under federal and state laws, and in fact, a Maryland state law that tried to regulate it without one was struck down as unconstitutional.

As to international price differentials, sure, we shouldn't be subsidizing developed economies (though ethically, I don't have as much problem subsidizing developing/undeveloped economies for a variety of public health reasons). But they are single payer systems, and negotiate like monopsonists. With the effect that drugs don't get covered, and don't get introduced first, there. That's a reasonable trade-off question to ask, but you really can't have both.

Price gouging does have it's limits and can be addressed under anti-trust though our government has chosen not to do so in the past few years. Price gouging requiring a shortage is no different than a new prescription that meets a need with no competition and a price that is many times a fully apportioned cost resulting in an economic barrier. Economic barriers can be illegal also.
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/clayton-antitrust-act.asp
 
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