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
43
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、Because there always appears the bubble market.
B、Because there is a healthy stock market.
C、Because there is an emphasis on higher stock price and earnings.
D、Because the economy is developping too fast.
答案
C
解析
推断题。录音中女士问是不是不负责导致了众多商业欺诈行为,男士回答说是,并解释说,美国的商界特别强调短期内股票价格要达到最高,强调他们的收益每个季度都要增加,股价每个季度都要升高。但是用传统的方法是达不到这些目标的,只好走上歧路。因此可以推断强调增加股价和收益成为不负责行为的原因,答案为[C]。
转载请注明原文地址:https://jikaoti.com/ti/d10YFFFM
0
专业英语八级
相关试题推荐
Manyarticlesandbookshavebeenwritteninrecentyearsaboutcultureinorganizations,usuallyreferredtoas"CorporateCult
InEnglishifawordbeginswitha[1]ora[r],thenthenextsoundmustbeavowel.Thisisa(n)
Itoftenhappensthatanumberofapplicantswithalmostidenticalqualificationsandexperienceallapplyforthesameposition
The18thcenturyinEnglishliteratureisanageof______.
Wheneverwecould,JoanandItookrefugeinthestreetsofGibraltar.TheEnglishman’shomeishiscastlebecausehehasnotmu
船在树下泊了片刻,岸上很湿,我们没有上去。朋友说这里是“鸟的天堂”,有许多只鸟在这棵树上做窝,农民不许人捉它们。我仿佛听见几只鸟扑翅的声音,但是等到我的眼睛注意地看那里时,我却看不见一只鸟的影子。只有无数的树根立在地上,像许多根木桩。地是湿的,大概涨潮时河
______isthefirstsuccessfulblackpoetintheAmericahistory.
A、ChinaandUSAB、ChileandFrance.C、FranceandCanada.D、EgyptandGreece.B
Almostalluniversitystudentswanttobesuccessfulinlearning,butmanyofthemfailtoachieveit.Whataretheprincipleso
随机试题
依据我国《票据法》的规定,定日付款或者出票后定期付款的汇票,持票人应该在——向付款人提示承兑。()
借助言语进行信息传递与交流的方式称为()
个人独资企业解散后,原投资人对个人独资企业存续期间的债务()
股票及其他有价证券的()是指以一定利率计算出来的未来收入的现值。
癸卯学制
土卫二是太阳系中迄今观测到存在地质喷发活动的3个星体之一,也是天体生物学最重要的研究对象之一。德国科学家借助卡西尼号土星探测器上的分析仪器发现,土卫二喷射出的微粒中含有钠盐。这说明,土卫二上存在液态水,甚至可以据此推测在其表面下存在“地下海”。如果以下哪项
Studythefollowingpicturecarefullyandwriteanessayentitled"Cultures—NationalandInternational".Intheessayyoushould
Developingtheprojectscheduleisoftenaniterativeprocess.Itdeterminestheplannedstartandfinishdatesforprojectactiv
下面关于S3C2410嵌入式微处理器芯片RTC的叙述中,错误的是()。
户外广告是现代城市景观中不可或缺的部分,反映着城市的繁荣程度,文化特色和品位。企业热切地希望通过户外广告不断提升形象,传播商业信息。各级政府也希望通过它树立城市形象,美化(beautify)城市。户外广告将会有广阔的市场,同时也对其提出了更高的要求。随着现
最新回复
(
0
)