Corporate Scandals

Corporate Scandals 
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Abstract
All corporate scandals ever reported result from lack of adherence of the business ethics and social morals within the environment where they are situated. The scandals vary in degree based on their effect on the lives of the employees and other stakeholders in the business. The article evaluates the common themes in the top 25 corporate scandals in the world and the extent of damage they have caused to the environment, people’s health and the economy. Corporate scandals that have affected the environment have led to devastating effected to their surrounding thus affecting people living within. Those that have led to economic losses have emptied pockets mostly for the low-income and individuals in the middle-class aspiring to invest and improve their financial status. Lastly, some of the corporate scandals have led to the deaths of thousands of employees and several other people caught up in the midst of the scandal. Despite the strict measures set in place to prevent more scandals and severe punishment on those caught, most firms still engage in unethical business practices and behavior with the aim of reaping more profits at the expense of the health of the workers and the environment.
Keywords: corporate, scandal, business ethics, social morals, environment

Corporate Scandals
The consequences of corporate scandals have not been limited to only financial losses but also deaths of thousands as in the case of the H&M, Zara and the Rana Plaza in Bangladesh collapsing on underpaid garment workers and people nearby and massive environmental pollution witnessed in the Volkswagen’s emissions and BP and the Deepwater Horizon oil spill scandal.

One of the most interesting of the top 25 scandals that the world will remain to remember for centuries is that of Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme which according to Yang (2014), led to $65 billion being robbed by Madoff from thousands of willing investors in his Ponzi scheme. Despite being detained for 150 years in prison, most firms around the world are yet to stop pursuing unethical business practices and behavior. A common trend among all the scandals are managers shielding themselves with the claim that their motives have led to the increase in employment opportunities and a significant reduction in poverty levels in their respective countries. However, taking an example of the GE’s corporate double-jet practice scandal, years later following the mismanagement of company’s resources by Jeff Immelt, up to 12,000 thousand of workers in the firm were to be laid off during General Electric CEO John Flannery in order for the company to recover from its financial depression (Vanian, 2017).
In all the 25 scandals, I find most people, especially those within the working and low-income class, suffering the most from the scandals in multinational companies. Moreover, I sampled most of the scandals and realized that they are all as a result of greed with few wealthy people in the companies, doing all it takes, at the expense of the health, lives and financial status of the workers, investors, and customers, to gain more wealth. The argument used by most of the managers caught in scandals that “business is just business” is rather far from the truth as without adhering to business ethics and social morals, businesses become nuclear weapons capable of destroying both people and environment.

References
Vanian, J. (2017, December 7). GE Is Laying Off 12,000 People from Its Power Business. Retrieved October 18, 2018, from http://fortune.com/2017/12/07/ge-layoff-power-business/Yang, S. (2014, July 01). 5 Years Ago, Bernie Madoff Was Sentenced to 150 Years in Prison – Here’s How His Scheme Worked. Retrieved October 18, 2018, from https://www.businessinsider.com/how-bernie-madoffs-ponzi-scheme-worked-2014-7?IR=T