Lehman Brothers

I recently attended a special speech given by the former vice president of the Joint equity and income division of the Lehman Brothers. The discussion was very interesting and educational. We learned about his life and about the collapse of the Lehman Brothers. He was born in Massachusetts in a poor part of the city. His parents divorced at a young age and he was on his own ever since. Since he grew up on his own and went to the poorest schools he decided he needed something better for himself. He went to school and graduated he did mediocre in his classes and was not at the top. He graduated from college and quickly started looking for a job on Wall Street. He did anything to get a job he applied many places and he even did the unthinkable and dresses up as a pizza delivery boy just to get through the door and get an interview. He tried at many places until he got his job with the Lehman brothers. He said one of the collapses with the Lehman brothers was the managing of the firm. The managing was one of where the CEO Mr. Fold had no communication with none of the worker he had about 17 seconds to talk to his workers and that’s it. He had his own elevator so that he would not bump into one of the workers and they would give him ideas while they were in the elevator. He was a man that kept much to himself. He had a style that was from the old ages he clearly did not know anything about 21st century management procedures.

ARISTOTLE

On December of 2009 in the international rights forum there was an article on how men have been hit hard by the economic crisis in Hong Kong. This means that their wives or the women of Hong Kong have to go out and look for jobs. Women are treated worse than men and they work harder and they get paid less. There is about twice as many women than men in Hong Kong and they work under the harshest conditions they get paid way less than the men. They also get discriminated against in various ways. They get fired if they become pregnant and if they try to file a complaint against being fired the company usually beat their case because the women can’t provide proof of being mistreated. When a women becomes pregnant and is working in a factory and she does not want to quit they usually push her to quit by giving her more hours and making her work in an unsafe environment were its too hot or the achiness that person is using are old and are about to break down somewhere she is more likely to become injured that way she could see that she has to quit or endanger her Childs live.

The ethical issue is the following are these conditions that the women are in considered to being in slavery conditions? Are they just normal work conditions that are approved by their country or by The United States? The problem that the U.S. has no say on what goes on in Hong Kong they work on their own problems with their own government. The Hong Kong government does not see anything wrong with this picture the women are there and their working and they are making them money that’s all they see. When the truth is that they are working like slaves they work extended hours at a pay that is less then minimum wage. They work in unsafe enviorments and they could be killed with the fumes that the factories let out. So is this slave work yes it is. Aristotle says that a person” is naturally a slave and a master is naturally a master.” He also says that it is only right to have slaves under certain conditions. He regards slaves as “living tools that produce something for their masters”. These women who are working in Hong Kong are what Aristotle calls “living tools”. There are living slaves.

This problem is not just found in Hong Kong its found all over In China in Mexico there is women who also work in harsh conditions and do not get paid well . The women in Mexico have to go to Juarez and work in horrible conditions and get paid not as much as the men for doing twice the labor. They also have to worry about being killed or abused or even kidnapped on the way home from work. These aren’t good working or living conditions. This happens in all industries in corporations as well. Take a company like Wal-Mart for example they employ hundreds of thousands of workers. These workers are not working under the best conditions either. Their vendors have to meet the requirements for Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart puts their own prices on the things they buy if the vendor cannot meet with the Wal-Mart requirement they lose that business and millions of dollars. Wal-Mart is not the only company that does this. Every company that have globalized has done or are doing this. Would you say these people are slaves off course they are.

Refernces-http://www.laborrights.org/rights-for-working-women/news/12231-For Article

Wal-Mart-The High cost of Low Price-Movie

Aristotle Book one Ch3