首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
Why are there so many corporate abuses today?
Why are there so many corporate abuses today?
admin
2014-07-25
62
问题
Why are there so many corporate abuses today?
W: Joining us to discuss all of this, George Washington University law professor Lawrence Mitchell. Professor Mitchell is the author of a book called Corporate Irresponsibility, the emphasis I believe on irresponsibility. Professor, the gist of your book and your views, [1] is it irresponsibility that is driving so many things in this corporate abuse context?
M: [1] Well, yes, it is, except that the most important thing to emphasize is the source of the irresponsibility and why it’s happening now. Because many people ask, we’ve had this great bubble market; we’ve had a healthy stock market, for the most part, since the Great Depressions, why all this now? [1] And the answer to that, it seems to me, is that over the past couple of decades, for a variety of sometimes related and sometimes unrelated reasons, what we have seen develop among the American investment community, as well as among corporate executives — and that is not unrelated — is an extraordinary emphasis on short-term stock price maximization, a need to get the earnings up every single quarter, to get the stock price up every single quarter. And you can not do that the old-fashioned way. You can not do it just by earning money. No business can do that over a sustained period of time.
W: Professor, in the business schools around the world, is the pursuit of the dollar and the yen and whatever currency we are talking about the driving force in the business world today?
M: Well, yes, actually. I think maybe business ethics will have a comeback, but yes. In fact, [2] my colleagues in the business schools tell me that they almost do not talk about ethics at all; they all talk about the bottom line. And that is something that has become increasingly true over the years.
W: Now, let us take the other side of that view, which is to say that businessmen, indeed the President of the United States and others, have said this is really just a few bad apples in the cart and it really does not represent the entire business world. What is your view about that?
M: I think that is true when you are talking about things like the kind of outright fraud and crime that we saw in the case of WorldCom, in the case of Global Crossing apparently, in the case of Enron apparently, Tyco — the list gets a little long. But I think that is right. 1 think, for the most part, it is true that most business people, just like you and me, go to work every day and try to do their jobs the best they can. They are honest, decent people. So, in that narrow respect of criminal activity or borderline criminal activity, he is right about it. [3] The broader problem, though, is the short term profit push is not just about crime, it is about stretching the accounting rules within legal limits but somehow distorting them. Managed earnings — nobody ever talked about managing earnings 20 years ago. This is a new concept. You find it, too, for example, in promiscuous layoffs. One of the best ways to get your quarterly numbers up is to lay off a bunch of people. [4] The great Jack Welch partly made his name firing 125,000 workers — 125,000 workers — over the course of his tenure at G. E. That is an enormous amount of people. And it is incredibly dislocating. You wind up with environmental short-cutting. You wind up sometimes with product short-cutting. We saw that in the auto industry, both with Ford and Firestone. We saw it in a couple of other cases where a few dollars here or there spent would have made a slight difference in the bottom line but it would have saved lives.
W: Let us talk for a moment or so — we have about a minute left in the segment — about the news, which is to say, Wednesday, the markets are surging back. How do you explain it? [5] I know that the conference committee on Capitol Hill has worked out some new legislation that would impose new penalties on corporate fraud. Is that part of the psychology that led to the surge today?
M: I think so. [5] I am tempted to say that it is because the President did not talk today, at least about this.
W: I am sure he would have another view on that.
M: I am sure he would, and we could disagree. I think this was predictable in some respects. You have seen over the last week people talking about the market trying to find its bottom. At this point, P/E ratios are below historical averages, and there is a point at which I think, even with the uncertainty, Wall Street says, "Enough, it is time to start buying again." All I can say is, wait till tomorrow.
W: All right, we’ll see. Professor Lawrence Mitchell, of George Washington University Law School, thanks for your interview. Professor Mitchell thanks so much for being with us.
M: Thank you for having me.
选项
A、It is about crime and fraud.
B、It is about distorting the accounting rules within legal limits.
C、It is about managing earnings.
D、It’s about the new legislation.
答案
B
解析
细节题。根据上题解析可知,追求短期利益不仅仅涉及到犯罪,还涉及在法律规则之内任意解释或歪曲会计规则。因此答案为[B]。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/3MpO777K
0
专业英语八级
相关试题推荐
Manyarticlesandbookshavebeenwritteninrecentyearsaboutcultureinorganizations,usuallyreferredtoas"CorporateCult
Itoftenhappensthatanumberofapplicantswithalmostidenticalqualificationsandexperienceallapplyforthesameposition
Wheneverwecould,JoanandItookrefugeinthestreetsofGibraltar.TheEnglishman’shomeishiscastlebecausehehasnotmu
NoEnglishmanbelievesinworkingfrombooklearning.Hesuspectseverythingnew,anddislikesit,unlesshecanbecompelle
AmericanGroupDynamicsToday,inWesternresearchinstitutesanduniversitydepartment,muchworkisdoneasateamprojecta
我最大的爱好是沉思默想。我可以一个人长时间地独处而感到愉快。独享欢乐是一种愉快,独自忧伤也是一种愉快。孤独的时候,精神不会是一片纯粹的空白,它仍然是一个丰富多彩的世界。情绪上的大欢乐和大悲痛往往都是在孤独中产生的。孤独中,思维可以不依照逻辑进行。孤独更多地
我以为,快乐的面貌总有成千上万,且是变化多端的。有时候它的出现过于意外,令人大喜大悲,但更多时候,它出现的方式却又是那么隐蔽,甚至让人觉得它平淡得近乎是不存在。当然意外式的快乐,出现的几率是微乎其微的。而平淡式的快乐却正好相反,它产生于生活的角角落落,只待
一个人有无智慧,往往体现在做事的方法上。借用别人的智慧助己成功,也是一条成功之道。《三国演义》中的刘备,文才不如诸葛亮,武功不如关羽和张飞,但他有一种别人不及的优点,那就是杰出的协调能力。他能够吸引这些优秀的人才为他所用。由此看来,能够发现别人的才
TheBattleForPlanetEarthThereisnoquestionthatsome"greenwashing"isgoingoninthecorporateworld.Bayemwerk,aB
Corporateexecutives,undoubtedly,playacrucialpartinacompany’smanagementandoperation.Somepeoplearguethattheonly
随机试题
着重研究如何提高单个工人的生产率的理论是()
最可能的诊断是该患儿的病理转变最严重的是
在一项膀胱癌与吸烟关系的前瞻性队列研究中,发现男性吸烟者膀胱癌的发病率为48.0/10万,不吸烟者为25.4/10万。人群中膀胱癌的发病率为31.0/10万。人群归因危险度百分比为()
病人哮喘时,最佳体位是
设幂级数的收敛半径为2,则幂级数的收敛区间是()。
根据《农田水利条例》(国务院令第669号)第十六条规定,政府投资建设的农田水利工程由县级以上人民政府有关部门组织竣工验收,并邀请有关专家和()参加。
王先生的投资包括三部分,一部分是年收益率为20%的A资产,总价值为15万元;另一部是年收益率为45%的B资产,总价值为10万元;还有一部分是年收益率为30%的C资产,总价值是15万元。那么,王先生这个投资组合的预期收益率是()。
在我国各民族团结坚如磐石的情况下,任何敌人的分裂破坏活动都是注定要彻底失败的。我国各民族之所以“团结坚如磐石”,是因为我国()。①是人民民主专政的社会主义国家,铲除了民族压迫与歧视的阶级根源②已经消除了各民族在政治、经济、文化和社会等方
试论物权的效力。
计算机病毒是指"能够侵入计算机系统并在计算机系统中潜伏、传播,破坏系统正常工作的一种具有繁殖能力的()。"
最新回复
(
0
)