Really? Because if someone gets me an expensive gift and it’s not my style, and I don’t want to offend the giver, I’m either going to wear it once to show them, display it once while they’re around, and then I’m getting rid of it. Whether that’s selling, re-gifting, or just donating. Once a gift is given, it belongs to the person who received it.
Being very good at what he does, better than his competitors isn’t cheating.
Years ago he had a lean year, needed to lay off staff. He offered to lay off staff, or have everyone work and be paid for 4 days a week. Staff picked 4 days a week. He then held quarterly staff meetings for everyone, where he showed them the whole company financials so everyone from president down to mail room knew where they were financially - they knew sales, then knew costs. When they were back in a position to put everyone to 5 days a week, they did so. Then when he put everyone back on 5 days, he also retroactively paid them back for the 5th day that they hadn’t worked. That seems like the opposite of ruthless to me.
It’s also the reason when I go back home where his business is, everyone wants to work for that company. People find out I know the owner, the first thing they ask me to do is get them a job there.
OTOH I can provide some compelling examples of ongoing, borderline illegal, ruthless behavior on the part of insurance companies. Yet here we all are.
And the point again is, you can be a decent person and still do well. Surely I’m not the only one here that knows wealthy people that are still decent folks.
I actually think most wealthy people are decent folks if you hang out with them. How they conduct their business is different though.
Okay fine. That was one example of being slightly shitty to get ahead in life.
I can think of others, I’m sure. Like having someone to take my SATs because SAT questions are definitely not indicative of future success and I personally don’t think investing time in taking the SATs is worth it.
Or maybe, not tipping ever, to save money. For example.
I think “immoral” is more accurate. Maybe unethical or selfish? Hard to say.
It reminds me of people who say there’s no morality when it comes to war (or love). Or people who think it’s okay to mistreat a stranger vs a friend or family or church member.
For anything there’s Law and then additional appropriate/selfless/considerate behavior.
Ain’t that the case - not all of this is black and white.
Say you’re an American company doing business worldwide. In some countries, if you want to sell your product, you have to pay a consultant. the consultant (who likely works for the company you’re trying to sell to), then recommends your product to that company. So, bribery with extra steps.
If you don’t pay the consultant, you don’t sell you product. Instead, your competitors who pay the consultant make the sale.
So do you pay the consultant? I don’t think it’s as easy as yes or no. Depends on your perspective.
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So why pay someone else to take them?
To get a good grade.
A good college name is worth it. Spending the energy and time to study for the SAT so that you can get into a good college is not.
Have you ever cheated on an actuarial exam? Plenty of things the SOA has made me do has been pointless and does not feel worthy of my time.
To what extent does the end justify the means?
I truly don’t understand these kinds of posts, or how this is even a discussion.
At the end of my life, I’m going to have to answer for my choices, either explicitly to a higher deity, or implicitly through my legacy. If my legacy is small but I am remembered as being kind, and my children have the opportunity to learn kindness through me, and I experience true joy along the way because of my choices and relationships and mindset, is that not a noble life?
Is life better lived at the expense of others? How have you felt when you’ve been taken advantage of, scammed, or intentionally harmed? Why would I want to teach my children that it’s acceptable to do those things to other people? And why would I want to teach them how to navigate a world where their success comes at a detriment to someone else?
I say it all the time, but kindness is the only currency worth anything.
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Well said. Good post. Thank you.
If my obituary mentions anything about my career as an actuary, I will have failed at living the life I aspire to. My children will make their own choices in their lives, but if they wind up wealthy, I will feel some disappointment in that.
I’ve considered it. Yes.
That’s easy to say, but many things are not as clear cut.
What if you pay the bare minimum wage to your employees, but is instrumental in a charity effort through your foundation to solve world hunger/disease eradication? What if you’re doing the charity for tax purposes, but end up saving millions of lives?
What if you became a billionaire through unethical means, but now that you’re a billionaire, you’re able to help way more people than you ever could had you been kind your whole life but poor?
What stopped you?
Nerve, mostly. But even if I did it wouldn’t have mattered, because I don’t believe the specific formulae I wanted to “peek” at came up.
I think I may have written some hard to remember formula or constant on my hand once, and that helped with a question or two. Could be for something else (not actuarial) though. It’s quite some time ago.
How many more people would you have helped if you became a billionaire through ethical means (in a theoretical world where that’s even possible)? How much better off would your employees be if you paid them a living wage and not less than enough to provide for themselves? How much better would their lives be, and how much more could they contribute to this world as a result of that?
Life is a lot of grey areas, but you can’t convince me that I should sacrifice kindness to get mine so that I can possibly give pennies of that back through a charitable effort. If kindness and ethics hinder your ability to live your best life, you’re going about it wrong.
:iatp:, although I’m a little more cynical and would say kindness is the base factor, but dollars’ factor is > 0.
Wow you’d cheat on an actuarial exam? To me it’s so incredibly out of the question at the very least of all because of the potential cost. I’ve spent a painful amount of time to be nearly finished with exams, the notion that I’d slightly help my chance at passing the next given exam at risk of the older exams, not to mention the risk of being kicked out of the CAS. I mean it’s just so not even close to be worth considering.