Phil 2230 Moral Issues in Business : Critique of Economics Parallels

In the Applied Ethics Exercise, students are being evaluated primarily on whether they can demonstrate knowledge of the relevant required readings, and meaningfully apply that knowledge to a critical analysis of a specific moral issue in business. You will be expected to examine one of the three following coronavirus case studies from within the perspective of one of the particular schools of moral philosophy studied thus far
in Phil 2230 (Aristotelian Virtue Ethics, Mill’s Utilitarianism, or Smith’s Moral Sentimentalism). *write an essay on ONE of the following applied ethics topics* 1) Critically analyze alleged pandemic price-gouging practices at Amazon from an Aristotelian perspective. Required Readings:

 Aristotle (1999). Read Parts I-II, IV & VIII-XI of ‘Book I’. Politics, Jowett (trans.). Batoche Books: Kitchener. .

 

 [UW LIBRARY E-BOOK] Dierksmeier, Clauss, & Pirson, Michael (2011). ‘Aristotle’s Economic Ethics’. Humanistic Ethics in the Age of Globality. Dierksmeier, Amann, et al. (eds.). Palgrave Macmillan: London.

 

 Evans, Pete (2020). ‘Amazon Accused of Price Gouging on Essential Items’, CBC .

 

 Palmer, Annie (2020). ‘Amazon Sellers Fined for Price Gouging Hand Sanitizer’. CNBC..

 

 Davies, Rob (2021). ‘Investigate Amazon over pandemic “price gouging”,’ The Guardian. .

 

 Anonymous (2021). ‘Covid-19 Price Rises Still Rampant on Amazon’, The Irish Times. https://www.irishtimes.com/business/retail-and-services/covid-19-price-rises-still-ramp ant-on-amazon-research-finds-1.4465276

 

2) Was Elon Musk’s anti-lockdown campaign and reopening of Tesla factories morally justified by the standards of John Stuart Mill’s Utilitarianism?
Required Readings:

 

 [URL LINK] Mill, John Stuart (2001). ‘What Utilitarianism Is’. Utilitarianism. Batoche
Books: Kitchener. .  [UW LIBRARY EBOOK] Gustafson, Andrew (2013). ‘In Defense of a Utilitarian Business Ethic’. Business and Society Review, Vol. 118, Is. 3.

 

 McFall-Johnsen, Morgan (2020). ‘Elon Musk Promoted Coronavirus Misinformation for Months’, Business Insider. .

 

 Siddiqui, Faiz (2021). ‘Hundreds of Covid Cases Reported at Tesla Plant following Musk’s.

Defiant Reopening’, Washington Post. .

 

 Anonymous (2021). ‘Hundreds of Tesla Workers got Covid after Elon Musk Reopened Factory’, The Independent.

 

3) Explore the morality/immorality of Wells Fargo’s alleged coronavirus relief and fraudulent consumer account scandal from the standpoint of Adam Smith’s moral sentimentalism. Required Readings:

 

 [URL LINK] Smith, Adam (1904). Read Chapters I-II of Book I of Volume I of The Wealth of Nations. Methuen & Co. Ltd.: London. .

 

 [URL LINK] Smith, Adam (1790). Read Chapter I and Chapter II of Section 1 of The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Millar (ed.),

 

 

 [UW LIBRARY E-BOOK] Wells, Thomas (2013). ‘Adam Smith on Morality and Self-Interest’. Handbook of the Philosophical Foundations of Business Ethics, Luetge (ed.). Springer: Dordrecht.

 

 Son, Hugh (2021). ‘Wells Fargo Tells Customers it’s Shuttering All Personal Lines of Credit’, CNBC. .

 Hussain, Noor Zainab and Henry, David (2020). ‘Wells Fargo Starts to Emerge from Sales Scandal’, Reuters. .

 

 Wamsley, Laurel (2020). ‘Wells Fargo Fires More Than 100 Employees Accused Of Coronavirus Relief Fraud’, NPR. .

 

 Peters, Justin (2020). ‘How Wells Fargo Became Synonymous With Scandal’, Slate. . Citations, Bibliography, & Formatting:

Students are expected to substantiate their interpretative claims about the philosophers in question and factual claims about the given topics by referring to list of required readings. To avoid plagiarism, provide a citation when borrowing the words, arguments, ideas, or research of others. Follow a simple in-text author-page system. For example, when quoting:

Whitehead’s critique of economics parallels his critique of science: economics, like science, is “suffering from a bad attack of muddle-headed positivism” (Whitehead, 204). However, even when paraphrasing an author in your words, or referring to a specific idea or argument of theirs, you must still offer a citation. For example:

Whitehead’s critique of economics parallels his critique of science: economics, like science, is based on positivistic assumptions (Whitehead, 204). A ‘Works Cited’ page containing all relevant bibliographic information should also accompany the assignment. Each entry should look something like this:

Whitehead, A.N. (1938). ‘Nature Lifeless’. Modes of Thought. Free Press: New York. Students must use 12-point Times New Roman font. Pages must be double-spaced with 2.5 cm margins. Your assignments should also have a separate title page with your name and a title. The Applied Ethics essay must be uploaded onto NEXUS in .PDF format. Apart from extenuating circumstances, late submissions will be penalized 5% per day. However, if discussed beforehand, extensions may be granted. Please familiarize yourself with the student code of conduct, specifically, the academic misconduct policies of the University of Winnipeg at the ‘Policies and Regulations’ webpage. https://www.uwinnipeg.ca/academics/calendar/docs/regulationsandpolicies.pdf