September 5, 2010
The Level-Minded Observer
March Madness Ethics; Cost-cutting and Theft; New Friends, Products, and Website; and Fr. Spitzer’s Call
This month’s roundup column of shorter items dissects the ethics of a common sports tradition that raises questions in some quarters. Also, we look at the disturbing but sadly predictable findings of an Ethics Resource Center study, share news of three developments of interest, provide an embedded video of Fr. Spitzer discussing his call to the priesthood, and end with a slightly amusing joke.
Are Office Pools Ethical?
Every year, sports fans are riveted by the excitement of March Madness, and tens of millions join office pools to bet on the college basketball tournament’s outcome. Filling out your brackets and seeing how your predictions hold up is a source of Level 2 competition but also Level 3 camaraderie among coworkers. But all this wagering, most of which is technically illegal, often sparks a question of whether or not these office pools are ethical. In the great scheme of things, this is not the most pressing of issues, but it touches so many people we thought an ethical analysis would be interesting. (Besides, we need something to make us forget Gonzaga’s fate in Round 2.) So we asked Fr. Robert Spitzer for his opinion, and he offered the following observations.
“I think that the vast majority of these March Madness office pools are ethically OK. They don’t necessarily violate any moral norm, because gambling itself is not intrinsically evil. It’s not like cheating, stealing, or lying, where there is intrinsic moral culpability. However, if you want to evaluate the ethics of a particular instance of gambling, you have to default to the criterion of harm and conduct a harms-benefit analysis. And obviously, there can be harms in gambling.
If you spend too much money on risks you should not be taking, I would call that the harm of nonaffordability. The result is hardship for yourself and for your family. It’s also harmful to encourage gambling among people who can’t afford it, which is why I don’t like state lotteries. It’s harmful to encourage people with addictive personalities to gamble because they can get out of control, and if you have an addictive personality, you should not gamble yourself. Gambling can also cause social harms by supporting organized crime and all its activities.
So the question becomes, do office pools cause any of the harms I’ve described? And in general, the answer is no. The bet required to enter the pool is usually quite small, and so long as that’s the case, it doesn’t pose a significant risk or temptation to the addictive personality. It’s not the same as buying 50 lottery tickets a week or gambling away your paycheck at a casino. Office pools don’t feed into organized crime, so I don’t see where they flunk a harms-benefit analysis. That’s why I think that ethically, office pools are OK so long as your employer doesn’t forbid them. “
As the Spitzer Center is not a law practice, we won’t render advice on the legal issue. But most legal websites acknowledge that arrest and prosecution for participating in office pools is virtually nil unless the pool is large and the person running it is skimming the proceeds (i.e., functioning like a bookie). Or as Fr. Spitzer observed, “It’s not the sort of thing that prosecutors and police tend to see as a violation of the spirit of the law. There doesn’t seem to be much likelihood that the police will come and break down the door to the office.”
Stat of the Month: Cost-Cutting and Misconduct
When the economic going gets tough, jobs and salaries aren’t the only thing to decline. According to a survey from the Ethics Resources Center (ERC), ethical conduct also tends to slide when companies face financial struggles. As the accompanying graphic illustrates, reports of observed theft and cheating on time or expenses rose as much as 50% or more in companies that had experienced layoffs, production slowdowns, or pay and benefit cuts.
These findings were part of the ERC’s 2009 National Business Ethics Survey, which gathered responses from more than 3,000 employees nationwide. Participants were asked about observed misconduct in 27 categories from abuse of company resources to discrimination, false statements, conflicts of interests, and document alteration. It found that cost-cutting measures increased the overall prevalence of all observed misconduct significantly. The study speculates that problems like theft and cheating reflect an effort by employees to “take back” what they feel they deserve.
The study also found that smaller companies were more likely to experience these problems than larger companies. Private companies, which have less observed misconduct in normal times, have the same level of observed problems during times of belt-tightening.
Old Friend Brings New Business to the Center
The Spitzer Center has been building stronger ties with companies in the New Orleans area thanks largely to the support of one of our directors, Stephen Stumpf, CEO of Durr Heavy Construction.
- Stumpf has been working with Executive Director Jim Berlucchi to evaluate the workplace culture of his own company using the Organizational Cultural Inventory (OCI). “Our leadership team has found the process and tool very helpful in our journey to strengthen a Level 3 culture at Durr," said Stumpf. "We engaged in a five-hour debrief of the findings in a facilitated session just last week. It was eye-opening and encouraging."
- Spartan Building Corporation in Madisonville, Louisiana, has asked the Center to present the Investment in Excellence program to a group of leaders from various organizations the company is assembling.
- Jim Berlucchi addressed a forum of WPO (World Presidents’ Organization) in New Orleans on March 17. The WPO is a global organization of more than 4,600 business leaders who are or have been chief executive officers of major companies and who are graduates of YPO (Young Presidents’ Organization).
The Word Among Us, a Maryland-based Catholic Publishing House, has also begun a relationship with the Center and used the OCI recently to gain insights into its organizational culture. “Our leadership team found the feedback data fascinating and affirming," noted Jeff Smith, WAU President.
Transforming the Culture Update
When he retired from Gonzaga last July, Fr. Spitzer said his new mission was to “transform the culture” by focusing on the two institutes he leads, the Spitzer Center and the Magis Center of Reason and Faith (MCRF). The latter is dedicated to instilling hope in young people and adults by showing the complementarity between physics, philosophy, and faith. Its initial projects include a new book by Fr. Spitzer called New Proofs for the Existence of God: Contributions of Contemporary Physics and Philosophy; a documentary entitled Astrophysics and Creation, and a new website, which went live earlier in March. You can learn more about this aspect of Fr. Spitzer’s mission by visiting the new MCRF website at this link.
Check Out Our New Products Page
Over the past year, we have received frequent requests for books and tapes by Fr. Spitzer. It recently occurred to us that, rather than fulfill orders over the phone, we might try something cutting-edge and sell these items via a page on our website. Our new Products Page, which went live last week, allows friends and supporters of the Center to purchase two of Fr. Spitzer’s most popular books and two audio CD products. We expect to be adding more writings, DVDs and CDs, and other products in the months to come. Many thanks to Sheri Hull, Spitzer Center administrator, for launching the service.
Video: Fr. Spitzer Discusses His Call to the Priesthood
Fr. Spitzer’s interest in business started early in life. As a student at Gonzaga University in the early 1970s, he majored in finance and accounting. He planned to follow up his degree in those disciplines with a law degree, until he realized that God had a different path in mind for him. In the video embedded below, he discusses his decision to set aside original plans and pursue a vocation to the priesthood. The seven-minute video clip is taken from an EWTN series, “The Call.”
Ethical Humor
“Johnny,’ said his teacher, ‘if hamburger is selling at $2.50 a pound and you tell the butcher you want $20 worth, how many pounds will he give you?”
“About 7 pounds, ma’am,” said Johnny promptly.
“Why, Johnny, that isn’t right.”
“No, ma’am, it ain’t, but they all do it.”
– John Keenan, Editor
john@spitzercenter.org
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Last changed: Mar 24 2010 at 2:51 PM