Carr's Points, Arged and Snarked

This is an absurdly detailed list of things Carr says in his article. Your list only needs to be about ten items. The trick is to look for the most significant and controversial things. If you can identify the absolutely most significant things he says, your list can be pretty short.

Now, assuming that the list is only really required to include really, really significant items, take a look at my list, and see if I caught any critically significant items that you didn't.

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0. A respected businessman with whom I discussed the theme of this article remarked with some heat, “You mean to say you’re going to encourage men to bluff? Why, bluffing is nothing more than a form of lying! You’re advising them to lie!”
---- It all depends on what you mean by "bluffing", doesn't it?
1. I agreed that the basis of private morality is a respect for truth and that the closer a businessman comes to the truth, the more he deserves respect.
---- Meh. Maybe there's a private morality where we beat up businessmen, and the more you beat up, the more you deserve respect.
2. At the same time, I suggested that most bluffing in business might be regarded simply as game strategy
---- Most mafia killings might be regarded simply as interpretive dance, but so what?
3. —much like bluffing in poker, which does not reflect on the morality of the bluffer.
---- You do know that life is not one big game of poker, right?.
4. I quoted Henry Taylor, the British statesman who pointed out that “falsehood ceases to be falsehood when it is understood on all sides that the truth is not expected to be spoken”
---- So a lie isn't a lie when everyone know you're lying. So why lie, if no-one ever believes you? (ARGUMENT?)
5. —an exact description of bluffing in poker, diplomacy, and business.
----Diplomats who lie often cause huge damage in the long run. The mere fact that they do lie doesn't make it okay.
6. I cited the analogy of the criminal court, where the criminal . . . .
---- You mean the defendant. And the fact that defendants sometimes lie is considered a problem. It's not considered okay.
7. . . . is not expected to tell the truth when he pleads “not guilty.
---- Have you never heard of perjury? People who lie on oath can be sent to prison. The courts can only work if witnesses generally tell the truth..
8. Everyone from the judge down takes it for granted that the job of the defendant’s attorney is to get his client off, not to reveal the truth;
---- Defense attorneys are officers of the court. They are not legally allowed to lie..
9. and this is considered ethical practice.
---- Withholding, yes. But telling lies is not considered ethical. And even if it was considered ethical, that wouldn't make it morally okay.
10. I mentioned Representative Omar Burleson, the Democrat from Texas, who was quoted as saying, in regard to the ethics of Congress, “Ethics is a barrel of worms”1—
---- I expect he was a lying scumbag, unfit to hold office. And this sounds like a cop-out..
11. a pungent summing up of the problem of deciding who is ethical in politics.
---- .No they don't. They really, really don't. We can figure out who is and isn't ethical by tracking their actual behavior.
12. — I reminded my friend that millions of businessmen feel constrained every day to say yes to their bosses when they secretly believe no and that
---- because their bosses are bags of scum who abuse their power. I have no problem with people who have to lie to evil bosses.
13. this is generally accepted as permissible strategy when the alternative might be the loss of a job.
---- yes, except, for the boss whose company went bust because an employee said "yes" when they were really thinking "no"..
14. The essential point, I said, is that the ethics of business are game ethics, different from the ethics of religion.
---- .and both are different from morality. A religion can be just as evil as a bad corporation. Neither get to set moral standards
15. He remained unconvinced. Referring to the company of which he is president, he declared: “Maybe that’s good enough for some businessmen, but I can tell you that we pride ourselves on our ethics. In 30 years not one customer has ever questioned my word or asked to check our figures. We’re loyal to our customers and fair to our suppliers. I regard my handshake on a deal as a contract. I’ve never entered into price fixing schemes with my competitors. I’ve never allowed my salesmen to spread injurious rumors about other companies. Our union contract is the best in our industry. And, if I do say so myself, our ethical standards are of the highest!”
---- Well, that's nice. Do you think those are good things? Do you think it's better to not do these things?
16. He really was saying, without realizing it, that he was living up to the ethical standards of the business game
---- No, he wasn't saying that. He was saying the thing he said. .
17. —which are a far cry from those of private life.
---- Really? Do you have an argument to support this claim?
18. Like a gentlemanly poker player, he did not play in cahoots with others at the table, try to smear their reputations, or hold back chips he owed them.
---- So what? Why should we care how things are done in poker?
19. But this same fine man, at that very time, was allowing one of his products to be advertised in a way that made it sound a great deal better than it actually was.
---- Meh. Everybody does that, pretty much. That doesn't make it okay, however.
20. Another item in his product line was notorious among dealers for its “built-in obsolescence.”
---- Is this well-known? Do business people make any effort to say to consumers "you should never trust us"?
21. He was holding back from the market a much-improved product because he did not want it to interfere with sales of the inferior item it would have replaced.
---- Okay, that doesn't seem problematic to me. Business gotta strategize.
22. He had joined with certain of his competitors in hiring a lobbyist to push a state legislature, by methods that he preferred not to know too much about, into amending a bill then being enacted.
---- All lobbyists are unscrupulous filth, as are the people who hire them. Lobbyists should not be allowed to exist.
23. In his view these things had nothing to do with ethics; they were merely normal business practice. He himself undoubtedly avoided outright false-hoods—never lied in so many words.
---- Soooooooooo, he thinks some things are okay, but others are not okay. Whereas you, Mr. Carr, think that all kinds of evil are fine if done by businesses for profit.
24. But the entire organization that he ruled was deeply involved in numerous strategies of deception.
---- That means he lies on a daily basis. "Don Respecto has never killed anyone, but his crime family kills people all over the place."
25. Pressure to Deceive. Most executives from time to time are almost compelled, in the interests of their companies or themselves, to practice some form of deception when negotiating with customers, dealers, labor unions, government officials,
----To make money, mafiosi are compelled to kill lots of innocent people
26. or even other departments of their companies.
---- To make more money, mafiosi are compelled to kill fellow mafiosi
27. By conscious misstatements, concealment of pertinent facts, or exaggeration—in short, by bluffing—they seek to persuade others to agree with them.
---- Regular people do this stuff too. They do it, to impress people, to get good jobs, to make friends, and to feel better about themselves,
28. I think it is fair to say that if the individual executive refuses to bluff from time to time—if he feels obligated to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth
----If not always telling the whole truth is the entirety of bluffing, then of course bluffing is okay. Not great, not good, but really not seriously wrong.
29. —he is ignoring opportunities permitted under the rules . . .
----Translation: Executives who don't bluff can miss opportunities. This is true. Look at Bill Gates!
30. . . . .and is at a heavy disadvantage in his business dealings.
---- Translation: Executives who don't bluff are at a disadvantage. Again true.
31. But here and there a businessman is unable to reconcile himself to the bluff in which he plays a part. His conscience, perhaps spurred by religious idealism, troubles him.
----if it's just bluffing, I don't believe you.
32. He feels guilty; he may develop an ulcer or a nervous tic.
----again, -if it's just bluffing, I don't believe you. I don't think bluffers feel bad about bluffing.
33. Before any executive can make profitable use of the strategy of the bluff, he needs to make sure that in bluffing he will not lose self-respect or become emotionally disturbed.
---- Well, successful lying requires a lot of self-confidence, sure.
34. If he is to reconcile personal integrity and high standards of honesty with the practical requirements of business, he must feel that his bluffs are ethically justified.
----You have no idea what integrity is. It's possible that a person with integrity might sometimes bluff, but feeling that it's ethical doesn't make it ethical.
35. The justification rests on the fact that business, as practiced by individuals as well as by corporations, has the impersonal character of a game
----ARGUMENT! This is the closest thing I've seen to a proper argument so far. (Question: Does Carr give a reason to think business has the character of a game?)
36. —a game that demands both special strategy and an understanding of its special ethics.
---- This is phrased to sound like Carr is stating an important truth. But really it's just making an unsupported claim.
37. The game is played at all levels of corporate life, from the highest to the lowest.
---- So corruption goes right to the top. I'm not surprised.
38. At the very instant that a man decides to enter business, he may be forced into a game situation, as is shown by the recent experience of a Cornell honor graduate who applied for a job with a large company: This applicant was given a psychological test which included the statement, “Of the following magazines, check any that you have read either regularly or from time to time, and double-check those which interest you most: Reader’s Digest, Time, Fortune, Saturday Evening Post, The New Republic, Life, Look, Ramparts, Newsweek, Business Week, U.S. News & World Report, The Nation, Playboy, Esquire, Harper’s, Sports Illustrated.” His tastes in reading were broad, and at one time or another he had read almost all of these magazines. He was a subscriber to The New Republic, an enthusiast for Ramparts, and an avid student of the pictures in Playboy. He was not sure whether his interest in Playboy would be held against him, but he had a shrewd suspicion that if he confessed to an interest in Ramparts and The New Republic, he would be thought a liberal, a radical, or at least an intellectual, and his chances of getting the job, which he needed, would greatly diminish. He therefore checked five of the more conservative magazines. Apparently it was a sound decision, for he got the job.
----Good for him. Evil people have no right to the truth, especially if they plan to discriminate against people with different politics.
39. He had made a game player’s decision, consistent with business ethics.
----more consistent with outsmarting unprincipled people.
40. A similar case is that of a magazine space salesman who, owing to a merger, suddenly found himself out of a job: This man was 58, and, in spite of a good record, his chance of getting a job elsewhere in a business where youth is favored in hiring practice was not good. He was a vigorous, healthy man, and only a considerable amount of gray in his hair suggested his age. Before beginning his job search he touched up his hair with a black dye to confine the gray to his temples. He knew that the truth about his age might well come out in time, but he calculated that he could deal with that situation when it arose. He and his wife decided that he could easily pass for 45, and he so stated his age on his resume.
----to avoid age discrimination. (Given that Carr keeps saying that businesses have a right to lie and cheat, there's no way it's immoral to lie and cheat right back at them.)
41. This was a lie; yet within the accepted rules of the business game, no moral culpability attaches to it.
----But the company would care if the deception is uncovered.
42. The Poker Analogy. We can learn a good deal about the nature of business by comparing it with poker.
----Only if it has been proved that poker is an exact moral analog of poker. Which it isn't. ARGUMENT
43. While both have a large element of chance, in the long run the winner is the man who plays with steady skill. In both games ultimate victory requires intimate knowledge of the rules, insight into the psychology of the other players, a bold front, a considerable amount of self-discipline, and the ability to respond swiftly and effectively to opportunities provided by chance.
----Duh
44. No one expects poker to be played on the ethical principles preached in churches. In poker it is right and proper to bluff a friend out of the rewards of being dealt a good hand. A player feels no more than a slight twinge of sympathy, if that, when—with nothing better than a single ace in his hand—he strips a heavy loser, who holds a pair, of the rest of his chips. It was up to the other fellow to protect himself.
----Here's where you confuse morality with religion. And poker is just a game. Played for amusement. Except when it's played to extract money from naive people.
45. In the words of an excellent poker player, former President Harry Truman, “If you can’t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen.” If one shows mercy to a loser in poker, it is a personal gesture, divorced from the rules of the game.
----Red Herring fallacy..
46. Poker has its special ethics, and here I am not referring to rules against cheating. The man who keeps an ace up his sleeve or who marks the cards is more than unethical; he is a crook, and can be punished as such
----Just like morality. However, I think the kinds of deception allowed by poker are not the kinds allowed by morality.
47. —kicked out of the game or,—in the Old West, shot.
----Man, it would be great if we could shoot business people who lie to us.
48. In contrast to the cheat, the unethical poker player is one who, while abiding by the letter of the rules, finds ways to put the other players at an unfair disadvantage. Perhaps he unnerves them with loud talk. Or he tries to get them drunk. Or he plays in cahoots with someone else at the table. Ethical poker players frown on such tactics.
----Okay, are you saying such things as these are not okay in business?
49. Poker’s own brand of ethics is different from the ethical ideals of civilized human relationships. The game calls for distrust of the other fellow. It ignores the claim of friendship. Cunning deception and concealment of one’s strength and intentions, not kindness and openheartedness, are vital in poker. No one thinks any the worse of poker on that account.
----I do.
50. And no one should think any the worse of the game of business because its standards of right and wrong differ from the prevailing traditions of morality in our society.
----Why not? Seriously, you haven't given any real reason for thinking that business really does have different standards of right and wrong
51. This view of business is especially worrisome to people without much business experience.
----This is the common rhetorical tactic of denigrating people who don't agree with you. You have no argument, so you sneer at you opponents.
52. A minister of my acquaintance once protested that business cannot possibly function in our society unless it is based on the Judeo-Christian system of ethics.
----In some ways, supposed Judeo-Christian rules are just as bad as special business rules. Also red herring. Function isn't morality.
53. He told me: “I know some businessmen have supplied call girls to customers, but there are always a few rotten apples in every barrel. That doesn’t mean the rest of the fruit isn’t sound. Surely the vast majority of businessmen are ethical."
----This is kind of a straw man fallacy. You're claiming, without argument, that it's morally okay for businessers to be lying bags of scum. This (possibly imaginary) minister is supposedly claiming that the majority of businessers are not scum. These claims don't really contradict each other.
54. "I myself am acquainted with many who adhere to strict codes of ethics based fundamentally on religious teachings."
----Yuck!.
55. They contribute to good causes.
----Hopefully to charities that don't discriminate.
56. They participate in community activities. They cooperate with other companies to improve working conditions in their industries. Certainly they are not indifferent to ethics.”
----That could be nice, depending on what you mean by "ethics".
57. That most businessmen are not indifferent to ethics in their private lives, everyone will agree. My point is that in their office lives they cease to be private citizens; they become game players who must be guided by a somewhat different set of ethical standards.
----You don't have an answer the minister? Also, this claim needs an argument. You keep saying it, but that's not an argument.
58. The point was forcefully made to me by a Midwestern executive who has given a good deal of thought to the question:
----ARGUMENT? Is this supposed to be an argument from authority? Are we supposed to agree with this guy because he doesn't think quickly? Or what?
59. “So long as a businessman complies with the laws of the land and avoids telling malicious lies, he’s ethical.
----What is his argument for this claim?
60. If the law as written gives a man a wide-open chance to make a killing, he’d be a fool not to take advantage of it.
----Don Robbybobby says that people who don't hijack trucks are fools. (The mafia regard law-abiding folk as "chumps".)
61. If he doesn’t, somebody else will.
----Robbins is mugged. His assailant is caught and put on trial. The mugger is acquitted because he proves that if he hadn't mugged Robbins, another mugger would have.
62. There’s no obligation on him to stop and consider who is going to get hurt. If the law says he can do it, that’s all the justification he needs. There’s nothing unethical about that. It’s just plain business sense.”
----or on anyone else, then. If I feel like dropping bombs on his Christmas dinner, I'm not obligated to consider who is going to get hurt.
63. This executive (call him Robbins) took the stand that even industrial espionage, which is frowned on by some businessmen, ought not to be considered unethical.
----Sooooooo it would be okay to steal all of his Midwestern secrets. Sounds good.
64. He recalled a recent meeting of the National Industrial Conference Board where an authority on marketing made a speech in which he deplored the employment of spies by business organizations. More and more companies, he pointed out, find it cheaper to penetrate the secrets of competitors with concealed cameras and microphones or by bribing employees than to set up costly research and design departments of their own.
----. . . and robbery and extortion are a lot easier than working for a living
65. A whole branch of the electronics industry has grown up with this trend, he continued, providing equipment to make industrial espionage easier.
----There's also an underground firearms market that supplies guns to criminals so that they can, for instance, rob Robbins.
66. Disturbing? The marketing expert found it so. But when it came to a remedy, he could only appeal to “respect for the golden rule.” Robbins thought this a confession of defeat, believing that the golden rule, for all its value as an ideal for society, is simply not feasible as a guide for business.
----What does he mean by "value" here? Is it value to him, so he can cheat others, but not be robbed of his gains on his way home?
67. A good part of the time the businessman is trying to do unto others as he hopes others will not do unto him.2 Robbins continued: “Espionage of one kind or another has become so common in business that it’s like taking a drink during Prohibition—it’s not considered sinful. And we don’t even have Prohibition where espionage is concerned; the law is very tolerant in this area. There’s no more shame for a business that uses secret agents than there is for a nation. Bear in mind that there already is at least one large corporation—you can buy its stock over the counter—that makes millions by providing counterespionage service to industrial firms. Espionage in business is not an ethical problem; it’s an established technique of business competition.”
---- It's done all the time, so it's morally okay. Not a good argument.
68. We don’t make the laws.’
Wherever we turn in business, we can perceive the sharp distinction between its ethical standards and those of the churches. Newspapers abound with sensational stories growing out of this distinction: We read one day that Senator Philip A. Hart of Michigan has attacked food processors for deceptive packaging of numerous products.
----. . . sometimes resulting in injury and death of consumers.
69. 3 The next day there is a Congressional to-do over Ralph Nader’s book, Unsafe At Any Speed, which demonstrates that automobile companies for years have neglected the safety of car-owning families.
---- . . . sometimes resulting in injury and death of members of those families
70. ‘4 Then another Senator, Lee Metcalf of Montana, and journalist Vic Reinemer show in their book, Overcharge, the methods by which utility companies elude regulating government bodies to extract unduly large payments from users of electricity.
----Not great, but seems better than making foods and cars that kill people.
71. 5 These are merely dramatic instances of a prevailing condition; there is hardly a major industry at which a similar attack could not be aimed. Critics of business regard such behavior as unethical, but the companies concerned know that they are merely playing the business game.
----"Critics of the Mafia regard extortion and murder as unethical, but the extortionists and hitmen concerned know that they are just playing the Mafia game."
72. Among the most respected of our business institutions are the insurance companies.
----Since when? And how did they become respected? Do they deserve respect?
73. A group of insurance executives meeting recently in New England was startled when their guest speaker, social critic Daniel Patrick Moynihan, roundly berated them for “unethical” practices. They had been guilty, Moynihan alleged, of using outdated actuarial tables to obtain unfairly high premiums.
----The cheating bastards
74. They habitually delayed the hearings of lawsuits against them in order to tire out the plaintiffs and win cheap settlements
----The filthy scum
75. In their employment policies they used ingenious devices to discriminate against certain minority groups.
----. . . thereby giving up some profit so they can be pigs to vulnerable people.
76. It was difficult for the audience to deny the validity of these charges. But these men were business game players. Their reaction to Moynihan’s attack was much the same as that of the automobile manufacturers to Nader, of the utilities to Senator Metcalf, and of the food processors to Senator Hart. If the laws governing their businesses change, or if public opinion becomes clamorous, they will make the necessary adjustments.
----as evil people are wont to do
77. But morally they have in their view done nothing wrong.
----After WWII, the Nazis also thought that they had in their view done nothing wrong. So what?
78. As long as they comply with the letter of the law, they are within their rights to operate their businesses as they see fit.
----Legal rights, not moral rights
79. The small business is in the same position as the great corporation in this respect. For example: In 1967 a key manufacturer was accused of providing master keys for automobiles to mail-order customers, although it was obvious that some of the purchasers might be automobile thieves.
----Maybe they could steal the cars of Midwestern executives. That would be cool.
80. His defense was plain and straightforward. If there was nothing in the law to prevent him from selling his keys to anyone who ordered them, it was not up to him to inquire as to his customers’ motives. Why was it any worse, he insisted, for him to sell car keys by mail, than for mail-order houses to sell guns that might be used for murder?
----Well, this is more of a legislation question. Has it been proved he's facilitating thievery?
Until the law was changed, the key manufacturer could regard himself as being just as ethical as any other businessman by the rules of the business game.
----And Lavrenti Beria could regard himself as being just as ethical as any other official, by the rules of the soviet power game. But so what?
81. Violations of the ethical ideals of society are common in business, but they are not necessarily violations of business principles.
---- Red herring fallacy. The question is, are they violations of moral principles permissible, not are they violations of business principles
82. Each year the Federal Trade Commission orders hundreds of companies, many of them of the first magnitude, to “cease and desist” from practices which, judged by ordinary standards, are of questionable morality
----Good for them. (Although I still like the idea of shooting bad executives.)
83. but which are stoutly defended by the companies concerned.
----These mass killings when judged by ordinary standards, are of questionable morality but which are stoutly defended by the genocidal mobs concerned.
84. In one case, a firm manufacturing a well-known mouthwash was accused of using a cheap form of alcohol possibly deleterious to health. The company’s chief executive, after testifying in Washington, made this comment privately: “We broke no law. We’re in a highly competitive industry. If we’re going to stay in business, we have to look for profit wherever the law permits. We don’t make the laws. We obey them. Then why do we have to put up with this ‘holier than thou’ talk about ethics? It’s sheer hypocrisy. We’re not in business to promote ethics.
----Nobody said he was in business to promote ethics. But they might say he's a greedy scumbag who doesn't care who he hurts.
85. Look at the cigarette companies, for God’s sake! If the ethics aren’t embodied in the laws by the men who made them, you can’t expect businessmen to fill the lack.
----That's true. We can't expect businessers to be good people. But they can't expect us to think they're ethical as they hurt people for profit.
86. Why, a sudden submission to Christian ethics by businessmen would bring about the greatest economic upheaval in history!”
----forget christian "ethics". What about actual morality?
87. It may be noted that the government failed to prove its case against him.
----That's a pity. I would have liked to see him go to prison, and live according to the special "prison game".
88. Talk about ethics by businessmen is often a thin decorative coating over the hard realities of the game:
----Translation: businessers who talk ethics are often actually very evil people. Oh, and how is this reality "hard"? Aren't you saying it's totally okay?
89. Once I listened to a speech by a young executive who pointed to a new industry code as proof that his company and its competitors were deeply aware of their responsibilities to society. It was a code of ethics, he said. The industry was going to police itself, to dissuade constituent companies from wrongdoing. His eyes shone with conviction and enthusiasm.
----Well, that's a sensible move, and a good one if it makes things better. Progress is progress.
90. The same day there was a meeting in a hotel room where the industry’s top executives met with the “czar” who was to administer the new code, a man of high repute. No one who was present could doubt their common attitude. In their eyes the code was designed primarily to forestall a move by the federal government to impose stern restrictions on the industry. They felt that the code would hamper them a good deal less than new federal laws would. It was, in other words, conceived as a protection for the industry, not for the public.
----Well, if this strategy makes things even a little bit better, it's still a good thing.
91. The young executive accepted the surface explanation of the code;
----Of all the characters in this story so far, this is the one for whom I have the most respect.
92. .these leaders, all experienced game players, did not deceive themselves for a moment about its purpose.
----just as all crooks have always done, all through history.
93. The illusion that business can afford to be guided by ethics as conceived in private life is often fostered by speeches and articles containing such phrases as, “It pays to be ethical,” or, “Sound ethics is good business.”
----Yes, these speakers are naive. But maybe some of them are genuinely ethical.
94. Actually this is not an ethical position at all; it is a self-serving calculation in disguise. The speaker is really saying that in the long run a company can make more money if it does not antagonize competitors, suppliers, employees, and customers by squeezing them too hard. He is saying that oversharp policies reduce ultimate gains.
----No, he's really saying what he says. He may be wrong, but he's really saying the things he says.
95.That is true, but it has nothing to do with ethics. The underlying attitude is much like that in the familiar story of the shopkeeper who finds an extra $20 bill in the cash register, debates with himself the ethical problem—should he tell his partner?—and finally decides to share the money because the gesture will give him an edge over the s.o.b. the next time they quarrel. I think it is fair to sum up the prevailing attitude of businessmen on ethics as follows: We live in what is probably the most competitive of the world’s civilized societies.
----That's not an attitude on ethics. And what exactly does "competitive mean here? Is it a synonym for "ruthless"?
96. Our customs encourage a high degree of aggression in the individual’s striving for success. Business is our main area of competition, and it has been ritualized into a game of strategy.
----So the evil in business arises from evil in society.
97. The basic rules of the game have been set by the government, which attempts to detect and punish business frauds. But as long as a company does not transgress the rules of the game set by law, it has the legal right to shape its strategy without reference to anything but its profits.
----"as long as a company doesn't break the law, whatever it does is legal" (Tautology)
98. If it takes a long-term view of its profits, it will preserve amicable relations, so far as possible, with those with whom it deals. A wise businessman will not seek advantage to the point where he generates dangerous hostility among employees, competitors, customers, government, or the public at large. But decisions in this area are, in the final test, decisions of strategy, not of ethics.
----"Careful crime bosses will not seek advantage to the point where he generates dangerous hostility from corrupt officials and fellow criminals
99. An individual within a company often finds it difficult to adjust to the requirements of the business game.
----It's hard to be good when everyone around you is scum.
100. He tries to preserve his private ethical standards in situations that call for game strategy. When he is obliged to carry out company policies that challenge his conception of himself as an ethical man, he suffers. It disturbs him when he is ordered, for instance, to deny a raise to a man who deserves it, to fire an employee of long standing, to prepare advertising that he believes to be misleading, to conceal facts that he feels customers are entitled to know, to cheapen the quality of materials used in the manufacture of an established product, to sell as new a product that he knows to be rebuilt, to exaggerate the curative powers of a medicinal preparation, or to coerce dealers.
----First, I don't believe that evil people generally feel bad about doing bad stuff. Second, oh boo hoo!
101. There are some fortunate executives who, by the nature of their work and circumstances, never have to face problems of this kind. But in one form or another the ethical dilemma is felt sooner or later by most businessmen. Possibly the dilemma is most painful not when the company forces the action on the executive but when he originates it himself—that is, when he has taken or is contemplating a step which is in his own interest but which runs counter to his early moral conditioning.
----Seriously? You want us to feel sympathy for the crawling slimes who initiate evil deeds?
102. To illustrate: The manager of an export department, eager to show rising sales, is pressed by a big customer to provide invoices which, while containing no overt falsehood that would violate a U.S. law, are so worded that the customer may be able to evade certain taxes in his homeland.
----Are those taxes fair? Does such evasion actually hurt any innocent people?
103. A company president finds that an aging executive, within a few years of retirement and his pension, is not as productive as formerly. Should he be kept on?
----Yes. The company made an agreement with him, and should live up to it.
104. The produce manager of a supermarket debates with himself whether to get rid of a lot of half-rotten tomatoes by including one, with its good side exposed, in every tomato six-pack.
----Good way to lose customers.
105. An accountant discovers that he has taken an improper deduction on his company’s tax return and fears the consequences if he calls the matter to the president’s attention, though he himself has done nothing illegal. Perhaps if he says nothing, no one will notice the error.
----Ummmm . . . this isn't much of an ethical problem.
106. A chief executive officer is asked by his directors to comment on a rumor that he owns stock in another company with which he has placed large orders. He could deny it, for the stock is in the name of his son-in-law and he has earlier formally instructed his son-in-law to sell the holding.
----Is innocent life or wellbeing involved? No? Then this isn't an ethical issue.
107. Temptations of this kind constantly arise in business. If an executive allows himself to be torn between a decision based on business considerations and one based on his private ethical code, he exposes himself to a grave psychological strain.
----In the words of an excellent poker player, former President Harry Truman, “If you can’t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen. Also, this sounds like a good reason to not be corrupted.
108. This is not to say that sound business strategy necessarily runs counter to ethical ideals. They may frequently coincide; and when they do, everyone is gratified.
----Whoop - de - doo
109. But the major tests of every move in business, as in all games of strategy, are legality and profit.
----Prove it.
110. A man who intends to be a winner in the business game must have a game player’s attitude.
----And a person who intends to not be scum must have an attitude of integrity.
111. The business strategist’s decisions must be as impersonal as those of a surgeon performing an operation—concentrating on objective and technique, and subordinating personal feelings.
----Comparing ruthless executives to surgeons does not help your case. A surgeon who lies about her abilities, who performs shoddy work, who in general behaves like Carr's "ethical" executives would be a really horrible thing.
And it's moral responisbility. not "personal feelings".
112. If the chief executive admits that his son-in-law owns the stock, it is because he stands to lose more if the fact comes out later than if he states it boldly and at once. If the supermarket manager orders the rotten tomatoes to be discarded, he does so to avoid an increase in consumer complaints and a loss of goodwill. The company president decides not to fire the elderly executive in the belief that the negative reaction of other employees would in the long run cost the company more than it would lose in keeping him and paying his pension.
----Um, okay. People often do the right thing for self-serving reasons. So what?
113. All sensible businessmen prefer to be truthful,
----I doubt that.
114. but they seldom feel inclined to tell the whole truth.
----sensible of them. It's a good idea to watch what you tell people.
115. In the business game truth-telling usually has to be kept within narrow limits if trouble is to be avoided.
----again a good rule in a lot of circumstances
116. The point was neatly made a long time ago (in 1888) by one of John D. Rockefeller’s associates, Paul Babcock, to Standard Oil Company executives who were about to testify before a government investigating committee: “Parry every question with answers which, while perfectly truthful, are evasive of bottom facts.”
----"be an evasive, dishonest, sack of excrement."
117. This was, is, and probably always will be regarded as wise and permissible business strategy.
----by dishonest people.
118. An executive’s family life can easily be dislocated if he fails to make a sharp distinction between the ethical systems of the home and the office—or if his wife does not grasp that distinction. Many a businessman who has remarked to his wife, “I had to let Jones go today” or “I had to admit to the boss that Jim has been goofing off lately,” has been met with an indignant protest. “How could you do a thing like that? You know Jones is over 50 and will have a lot of trouble getting another job.” Or, “You did that to Jim? With his wife ill and all the worry she’s been having with the kids?”
----This assumes that executives are married to people who are not themselves scum.
119. If the executive insists that he had no choice because the profits of the company and his own security were involved, he may see a certain cool and ominous reappraisal in his wife’s eyes.
----hopefully she's thinking it's time to hire an "ethical" divorce lawyer. Remember, stealing, lying, and every other kind of evils are all just part of the divorce lawyer game.
120. Many wives are not prepared to accept the fact . . .
----"lie"
121. . . . that business operates with a special code of ethics.
----Good for them. At least they're not scum like their disgusting husbands
122. An illuminating illustration . . .
----No, no, no need to illustrate. I'm perfectly willing to believe that at least some good people exist.
123. <Excruciatingly boring story of "Tom" and "Mary" mostly redacted> This wife saw the problem in terms of moral obligation as conceived in private life; her husband saw it as a matter of game strategy.
----This seems to be basically a matter of "supporting" his position by pretending that disagreeing with him can only be based on naivete. He also assumes tha
124. As a player in a weak position, he felt that he could not afford to indulge an ethical sentiment that might have cost him his seat at the table.
----That seems reasonable. Even the most ethical person needs to choose their battles. Sometimes compromise is morally allowable. Sometimes it's morally necessary.
I wonder what Mary would have said if Tom had confessed to marketing baby formula in such a way as to cause the unnecessary deaths of countless infant children.
125. Some men might challenge the Colbys of business—might accept serious setbacks to their business careers rather than risk a feeling of moral cowardice.
----To not be scum, you mean.
126. They merit our respect—but as private individuals, not businessmen.
----Really, it is never the case that anyone merits our respect as a businessman. Woo-hoo, look at me, I make lots of money! That's nice for you, but you making profits does not in itself merit any respect from me. If anything, I look down on you, you moneygrubbing twat.
127. When the skillful player of the business game is compelled to submit to unfair pressure, he does not castigate himself for moral weakness. Instead, he strives to put himself into a strong position where he can defend himself against such pressures in the future without loss.
----It is really hard to resit making comparisons with skillful players of the crime game, skillful stormtroopers of the Waffen SS, skillful chekists of the KGB . . .
128. If a man plans to take a seat in the business game, he owes it to himself to master the principles by which the game is played, including its special ethical outlook. He can then hardly fail to recognize that an occasional bluff may well be justified in terms of the game’s ethics and warranted in terms of economic necessity. Once he clears his mind on this point, he is in a good position to match his strategy against that of the other players. He can then determine objectively whether a bluff in a given situation has a good chance of succeeding and can decide when and how to bluff, without a feeling of ethical transgression.
----I cannot imagine that you get invited to many parties, the pompous way you talk.
129. To be a winner, a man must play to win.
----Wanker
130. This does not mean that he must be ruthless, cruel, harsh, or treacherous.
----Oh, that's nice. So these things are ruled out after all?
131. On the contrary, the better his reputation for integrity, honesty, and decency, the better his chances of victory will be in the long run.
----This implies that no businessman deserves a reputation for honesty
132. But from time to time every businessman, like every poker player, is offered a choice between certain loss or bluffing within the legal rules of the game. If he is not resigned to losing, if he wants to rise in his company and industry, then in such a crisis he will bluff—and bluff hard.
----Um, yeah, sure. But this is waaaaay off the topic of whether the kinds of bluffing that damage, injure, or kill consumers are morally acceptable.
133. Every now and then one meets a successful businessman who has conveniently forgotten the small or large deceptions that he practiced on his way to fortune. “God gave me my money,” old John D. Rockefeller once piously told a Sunday school class. It would be a rare tycoon in our time who would risk the horse laugh with which such a remark would be greeted.
----No, no, there are still hypocritical assholes in the world. Self-serving stupidity never, ever dies.
134. In the last third of the twentieth century even children are aware that if a man has become prosperous in business, he has sometimes departed from the strict truth in order to overcome obstacles or has practiced the more subtle deceptions of the half-truth or the misleading omission.
----I wish this was true. It would make things a lot better if all consumers were firmly convinced that all business people are fundamentally dishonest and untrustworthy.
135. Whatever the form of the bluff, it is an integral part of the game, and the executive who does not master its techniques is not likely to accumulate much money or power.
----Which implies that anyone who has any significant quantity of money or power is a lying. Good to know.

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