The Ford Pinto

Utilitarian’s try to separate the action from the actor, and look at the bigger picture over the individual. Followers of Kant, disagree with this approach, and claim that in this system, minorities and individuals are often overlooked and brushed aside. Kant argues that any action cannot be moral unless the motives are moral.

The customers (drivers of Ford) are the number one stakeholders that lost the most. They might not have lost much money or reputations, but they lost the one thing that you can never get back, their life.

Indubitably, the company wronged the consumers and passengers by violating their rights to not be killed in a car fire and their right to minimal health

Milton Friedman believed a free-market system, in which goods and services are exchanged and controlled by individuals and privately-owned businesses without government authority, was the only way to achieve personal freedom. Adam Smith, a 18th century philosopher and economist, held the belief that in a free society, the role of government should be limited to the protection of the people, the administration of justice through the court system, and the maintenance of all public resources. Adam Smith developed the concept of the “invisible hand” theory, which says within a society that is free of government interference, individuals can pursue actions out of their own self-interest, and the collective result of this

White Collar Crime, known by many as a form of crime that is greatly overlooked throughout the criminal justice system, has proven itself time and time again to be just as dangerous and damaging to those affected as all other crimes combined. There have been many cases throughout our nation’s past that have not only scarred, but ended hundreds of lives as a result of White Collar Crime. One in particular, is the popularly known Ford Pinto Case. The constant want for more, more money, more product, more success, by many top corporation leaders throughout the United States, has resulted in deathly consequences, in which those responsible receive very little repercussions for. In pursuit for these great things, Ford Motor Company was willing to anything necessary to remain at the top of the auto industry. As stated in the article, Case: The Ford Pinto, throughout Detroit, home of Ford Motor Company, worry had quickly turned to panic as Japanese and German subcompact vehicles began to take over the market (Shaw & Berry, 2001). Due to Ford’s relentless desire to stay competitive with the many other successful car companies throughout the world, the decision was made to create the Ford Pinto, in hopes of giving them the edge they needed. Little did buyers know, the creation of this vehicle would be the cause of several deaths and injuries as a result of Ford Motor Company’s willingness to do anything necessary in order to generate more revenue

As Friedman has argued, the role of business is to make money and a cost benefit analysis is a very useful tool in figuring out how to do so. When it comes to morals, however, cost-benefit analysis is much less useful unless one believes in utilitarianism. For other understanding of morality, a person should not be asking “what do I gain and lose” when trying to figure out what to do. People should be asking “what’s the right thing to do”. Cost-benefit analysis can’t really help with that. An examination of the Ford Pinto Case, the cost-benefit analysis, will help raise the awareness and understanding of the diminishing value of ethics in the business world. When Ford conducted the cost-benefit analysis, it analyzed what the potential benefit would be if they fixed every Pinto by installing the baffle piece. The result produced from the cost-benefit analysis may be interpreted to say that it would have cost Ford $137 million to fix the Pintos by installing the baffle piece when it would have cost $49.5 million to leave the cars alone and deal with the expenses of injuries and deaths from the crashes. Ford decided that, because it would be cheaper, it would not install the baffle piece. According to De George, Ford did not tell the consumer that the car was not as safe as others, nor did it inform consumers that they had the option of purchasing the baffle piece (De George, 1995). In Ford contention is that these decision are moral ones, and that cost-benefit analysis is

Save money or save lives. In this paper I will explain the ethical problems with the Ford Pinto and why it’s imperative for corporations to incorporate ethics into their companies.

The Ford Pinto case in (Shaw, Barry & Sansbury 2009, p97) stated that Ford decided to continue produce the Pinto without making an improvement regardless of consumers’ safety because its prototype tests did not meet the safety requirement of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. They should not put the value of money prioritise than human life. Firstly, they decided to sell it instead of making an improvement. Next, they were dishonest because they did not dispose it out to outside world about the dangerous of the Ford Pinto and tried to keep for secret. Besides, they used their lobby power

Kant also believes that human beings have “unconditional worth.” In his passage of, “The Ultimate worth of Persons,” he says:

In the mid to late 1960’s American automobile manufacturing was being dominated by Japanese imports. These imports, smaller in size than the domestic vehicles at the time, offered an economical and dependable alternative to what American automobiles offered. In order to remain competitive with these Japanese imports Ford chief executive officer Lee Iacoca instructed the Ford manufacturing company to come up with a vehicle for the 1971 sales year to compete with these Japanese imports. The normal time for design and production for a new vehicle line is 43 months but Iacoca ordered the process to be reduced to 25 months in order to compete. The timeline was met but a rear-end impact study was not conducted until after the car was already on sales lots. Drawn to the relatively inexpensive price for a vehicle at the time, Lily Gray purchased a 1972 Ford Pinto. This is where the production flaw of the Pinto was first revealed. Gray was traveling with 13 year old Richard Grimshaw on the highway when she had to slow to avoid a broke down vehicle. Also trying to avoid the broke down vehicle a Ford Galaxy traveling at approximately 50 miles per hour rear ended the Pinto. Almost immediately the Pinto burst into flames, both passengers had severe burns on their bodies, and later Lily Gray would pass away as a result of the burns from the crash.

A ball of fires comes from the small compact car called the Ford Pinto. Just a touch of the bumper will cause injury and death to happen in this car. This car has been known through time to be a very dangerous car. The history of the car, the way the car was designed and made, and the aftermath and problems it caused prove why this car is such a dangerous car. The car itself was the start of an era for small compact cars.

Americans are known to be risk takers and capital makers. In the US it is possible to begin a business of humble means and expand it to grow into a model for people wanting to start a new business. This is the epitome of wealth and capitalism in the US. Capitalism in the US has no color and welcomes anyone willing to work hard, market a product and to bring it to fruition. Americans are said to be moved by their fear of failure and their greed for monetary success. Capitalism allows private ownership to inspire production of goods and allows the private owner to keep and track profits for what sells. This allows exclusive rights and patents to the production of modern technology and boosts the social economy.

Dowie, asserts through his finding that the Ford motor company made a fundamental moral mistake because it made a product which it knew was capable of harming humans. Dowie attacks ford under the condition that they knowingly provided the American market with an unsafe product. This assertion is not correct; Dowie’s article provides contradictory statistics, speculation, and little to no inference. Dowie does not consider does not consider the importance of market forces in his assessment of Fords ethics which is a pertinent aspect of the time. The Pinto was in demand not because of their safety features but because they were cheap and fuel efficient. The Ford motor company was doing what all companies do, that is sell products. Ford’s concern

* Kantian Ethics- the belief that people should be treated as ends and never as means to the ends of others

7. Kant’s ethics gives us firm standards that do not depend on results; it injects a humanistic element into moral decision making and stresses the importance of acting on principle and from a sense of duty. Critics, however, worry that (a) Kant’s view of moral worth is too restrictive, (b) the categorical imperative is not a sufficient test of right and wrong, and (c) distinguishing between treating people as means and respecting them as ends in themselves may be difficult in practice.