Bain Capital And Business Ethics

Let’s talk about ethics. Like it or not, business ethics are not absolute, they change from age to age. For example, 300 years ago children worked in factories in conditions we now consider deplorable. It was ethical to employ children then, given the extreme hardship and poverty of the times. Today, children do not have to work to survive. It would be unethical to hire them to work as they did 300 years ago. That said, I am certainly not contending that, within the context of the times, every action of the so-called Robber Barons was ethical.

Were the actions of Bain Capital unethical? All I can say with certainty is that cutting wages and dismissing employees in and of itself is not evidence of unethical conduct.