Business Crime

• Crimes That Harm Business versus Crimes Committed by Business

The gist of the matter is that it is the persons mandated by shareholders who instigate the commission or omissions that lead to criminal outcomes (Cullen, Cavender, Maakestad & Benson, 2014). When a business entity is slapped with fines aimed at executing justice to a bereaved society; it is the shareholder as well as other persons who were not in any way privy to a criminal outcome that pay for such penalties. This essay seeks to argue that it is persons tasked with overseeing an entity’s operations that commit crimes that tend to harm business.

In many instances, it is common to find that when a corporation is duly convicted of criminal offenses, its leaders and executive members simply go unpunished. A good example is infamous oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico which occurred in 2010 where Halliburton, the corporation in question was charged with the ruin of crucial evidence of the case (Krauss, 2013). The outcome of this particular court process was Halliburton being directed make good to a 200,000 dollar fine. The magnitude of the environmental and social damage was immense and for such a big corporation to pay such a paltry fine and also gain immunity from further prosecution relative to the oil spill was is indeed a heinous crime.

Halliburton was unquestionably let lose for its criminal actions and by extension, serves no deterrent against other large corporations propagating crime (Cullen, Cavender, Maakestad & Benson, 2014). If the corporation suffered from the penalty, the shareholders definitely passed on the suffering to consumers via pricing of its products. Other corporations which have been charged with similarly heinous crimes are Eli Lilly, BP and GlaxoSmithKline. Making the executives of such companies can go a long way in serving as deterrent by other individuals in similar positions within large organizations. Crimes instigated by executives harm business and should face the full wrath of the law.

References

Cullen, F. T., Cavender, G., Maakestad, W. J., & Benson, M. L. (2014).Corporate crime under attack: The fight to criminalize business violence. London, UK: Routledge.

Krauss, C. (2013). More Halliburton pleads guilty to destroying evidence after Gulf spill. The New York Times Company. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/26/business/halliburton-pleads-guilty-to-destroying-evidence-after-gulf-spill.html

• Product Liability

Response 1

Globalization has tremendously decreased production costs through a number of outsourcing avenues. However, some of the products originate from countries with lax laws and regulations relative to consumer protection. It is therefore evident that some of the outsourced products tend to be highly prone to manufacturing, design as well as instructional defects (Allee, Mayer & Patryk, 2016). US legislation proactively seeks to protect its consumers in the manufacturing industry, all known industries and by extension, the end consumer within its expansive society.

Therefore, retailers who offer defective products to US consumers violate a host of the country’s product liability legislations. These laws tend to vary by state ban normally are subdivided into five forms. Negligence, strict liability, misrepresentation and fraud, breach of warranty as well as the duty under common law to ascertain product safety (Brien & Hine, 2015). Failure to place tort liability on unethical US companies would expose US consumers to massive safety risks, a policy detrimental to the positive development of US society.

Response 2

The federal agencies are not in a position to ascertain quality parameters of imported products owing to budget constraints (Allee, Mayer & Patryk, 2016). It is thus, imperative that importing companies employ strategies aimed at appraising consumer safety at all costs as this not only ensure consumer safety but will inform business growth. Testing will enable such companies to ensure that imported goods conform to US standards and as such, inform decisions to continue business with outsourced organizations offering safe products.

This may prove to be costly for an organization in terms of time required to release a given product to US markets, qualified staff for quality control and assurance, logistical challenges and costs of equipment needed to accurately ascertain quality (Brien & Hine, 2015). However, such costs will ultimately prove to be lower in the longer term in comparison to suits stemming from product liability suits and loss of market share in a dynamic environment.

References

Allee, J. S., Mayer, T. V., & Patryk, R. W. (2016). Product liability. Law Journal Press.

Brien, S. T., & Hine, L. L. (2015). Complex products and comprehensive service agreements: A case study of outsourcing in contract cities. Journal of Public Procurement,15(2).