George Washington on the dollar bill? No! It's 18th Century philosopher Immaneul Kant, whose idea of universality in ethical guildelines plays heavily in the conclusion of this column.
, thanks to the fees banks slapped on our accounts.
But what about the other side of that coin? What if items we buy using our credit card never show up on our statement? We get off scot-free. Do we hunt down the merchant to pay anyway?
A reader from Tigard put this question to me last week. She asked to be identified only by her first name.
While vacationing in New Mexico in September, Kathy used her Visa to pay for a $34 tour of
, an 850-year-old Native American village perched atop a 360-foot sandstone mesa west of Albuquerque. She also charged $11.99 for two bowls of green chile stew at the Y'aak’a Café inside the
She knows this because she, unlike most of us, keeps all her receipts.
Six weeks later, those charges had yet to appear on her Visa statement.
"Do I have an ethical responsibility to pay those charges?" she wondered. "I think I do."
"I happen to think if it was my business," she continued, "I'd want people to call and make sure charges went through for the goods and services I provided."
Her friends disagree, she said. It's simply not enough money to take the time to correct.
A similar conundrum befell me the next day when I went to a bar to watch "Monday Night Football." The pub failed to charge me for one of my two drinks. I discovered this omission as I walked out and glanced at my receipt. But I didn't walk back inside. I figuratively shrugged my shoulders: "Oh, well. They'll never know. It's their responsibility to keep track of my order, anyway."
I take my ethical responsibilities as a journalist, parent and citizen seriously. But my reaction Monday night reflects how I often react to merchant mistakes. I usually do what's in my best interest. I stay quiet.
Yet Kathy still wanted my thoughts.
I sought other sources for help.
about what they'd do in her situation. Almost half said they would pay the missing charges. More than a third said they wouldn't. Ten percent said they'd pay only if the charges involved large amounts of money.
Others cited additional considerations. "The entity owed seems to mean everything to me," wrote one respondent. Another would pay "only if it was a small business."
Should any of those details matter?
Michael F. Andrews, ethics professor at the University of Portland.
To answer that, I turned to
, professor of ethics at the University of Portland.
Andrews sent a "quick" 1,400-word response that was reasoned, eloquent and easy to read. Find it at the end of this column.
In sum, Andrews says we assume a responsibility to pay for an item the minute we agree to do so, whether that's by handshake, signature or other form of decree. The amounts, entity owed, consequences or what friends think should have no bearing on that responsibility. Nor does the fact that a merchant, bank or payment system failed to process the charge correctly.
"Ethics," Andrews wrote, "is not traditionally concerned with attempting to rationalize ways by which I can step aside from responsibilities that I freely take upon myself."
British 19th century philosopher and economist
might have argued we should consider the utility of repaying the transaction. Does it provide the greatest amount of happiness to the greatest number of people with the least amount of pain?
This is roughly the view of Kathy's friend: It's too painful for everyone to bother to correct. Yet to really figure that out, Kathy and I might make a list of all the people who would gain from not taking responsibility for the charges along with a list of any pain that might result, Andrews said.
In the case of my missing charge, I wonder: Will the pub owner have to skip out on the light bill this month? (No.) More concerning: Did I give the server too small a tip? (Probably.)
Economy of trustMill's concept of "utility," however practical, doesn't take into account a more universal principle, Andrews said. The 18th century philosopher
suggests that we should judge our actions on whether we expect every other person to act the same way, under the same circumstances -- no exceptions. In other words, we should act as if our actions could become universal law.
"For Kant, no rational or ethical person would make lying a universal principle since, by so doing, the very fabric of society, in terms of trust and honesty, would break down totally and irrevocably," Andrews said.
"Ultimately, economics works on trust, or it doesn't work at all," he added. And we certainly become less authentic than we make ourselves out to be.
"Pay the charges," Andrews concluded. "That's what you agreed to do, that's what you signed the dotted line to do, that's what you said you were going to do. To try to get out of your commitment because the charges were never processed is a little like saying that it's OK to cheat as long as your spouse or significant other fails to notice your repeated acts of infidelity.
"Judging the rightness or wrongness of an action by 'whether I can get away with it' may sadly be our new national mantra. But it isn't ethical."
Competing interestsThis discussion might raise more questions and trigger anger in light of what happened to our investments, homes and savings in recent years. Certainly, Wall Street financiers acted in their own interest. But many -- probably most -- of us did, too, when we re-refinanced our mortgages, took on more debt than we could withstand in the event of a future pay cut and tried to keep up with the Adamses next door.
Last week, Karen notified Acoma's accounting department of the missing charges.
She did that partly out of her sense of universality and partly, she conceded, because the debt was owed to the people of the Acoma Pueblo.
"I sense they were not well off . less so than a million-dollar corporation," she said.
Would you pay? Does the debtor matter?
at and weigh in on the comments below.
welcomes questions about his column or blog. Reach him at 503-221-8359. Follow him on
Here's Michael Andrews' full response to my question from Dr. Michael F. Andrews,
McNerney-Hanson Endowed Chair in Ethics and Professor of Philosophy at The University of Portland:
Here is a quick response to your question. I thought it might be helpful to come from a variety of ethical perspectives:
The scenario you describe represents an attitude that many people --- including many young people --- possess today concerning their relationship with banks, the government, institutions in general --- even friends and family. Because someone else did not correctly process the financial charges of a business transaction, there appears to be (at first glance, at least) not much of an ethical dilemma here for many people. "Its not my job to do someone else's job for them!," is how a bright and seemingly honest person might first respond. Add to this scenario an assumption that the "error" of not processing a particular visa transaction is the fault of a machine or a non-human corporate entity and the picture becomes farcical. No one is really hurting anyone, so what's the big deal? I am free --- encouraged, even --- to do as I please as long as what I do ( or don't do) does not cause anyone pain. This is true even more so if my actions or omissions do not encounter a human face.
Ethics, however, is not traditionally concerned with attempting to rationalize ways by which I can step aside from responsibilities that I freely take upon myself. In effect, such responsibilities bind me to a richer and more complex reality than what is possible to issue based on my own self-interest. Ethics points beyond self-interest towards that which earlier generations sometimes took for granted: the common good. Aristotle, who first put formal ethics on the map, says that "doing what is right" amounts to a kind of virtue, based on habit, which leads to a particular activity of the soul. Justice is therefore political --- that is, social --- in nature, because it regulates everything from friendship to the economy. Hence, just as a good flutist must practice playing the flute, so too a "good person" must practice being good. And by "being good" Aristotle means acting virtuously, namely, seeking the good as an end in-itself, rather than something that merely portends what is good-for-me. A person cannot be virtuous, Aristotle notes, without acting virtuously. For the Greeks --- who equated virtue with democracy, and democracy with citizenship --- virtue necessitates that the common good is what everyone seeks. Virtue was thus defined as a "public thing," that is, as a mode or ethos of acting that is rooted to the res publica. By failing to pay charges for services that I contracted, I am, in effect, breaking my relationship to the common good, the same common good that I tend to uphold in my role as a public citizen and as a man or woman of virtue. So, by not taking responsibility for my actions, I fail to uphold the responsibilities that I have freely --- and publicly, by the political act of signing my name to a contract --- agreed to uphold.
J. S. Mill, on the other hand, might argue that my only concern is utility, that is, providing the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of persons, along with the minimal amount of pain. Such calculation would require that I make a list of all the people who would benefit from my not taking responsibility for the charges that were made in my name (yet never processed), along with a list of any amount of pain that also may result. (In this case, I may be horrified to learn that the waitress, for example, may have to pay out of her own pocket for the meal that I originally transacted.) But pangs of conscience aside, my friends and I will usually win hand's down --- especially when "the greatest happiness principle" is compared against the bottom-line spreadsheet of a nameless corporation or an anonymous government agency.
Of course, there is one particular problem that mitigates against taking Mill's position. As Immanuel Kant might ask, Am I making a universal principle of my actions? In other words, for an act to be ethical, Kant holds that I must "will" that my actions be considered a categorical imperative. What on earth is a categorical imperative? Simply stated, Kant suggests that every action I make must be defined as an action by which I commit every other person to act the same way under the same circumstances. And, oh yes, with one caveat: There are NO EXCEPTIONS to the rule. Hence, if I am caught in a pickle (so to speak) and I have the opportunity to lie such that no one will ever know that I lied, still (Kant says) I must never lie. Why? Because, by lying, I will that every other person also lie as a categorical imperative, that is, a rule issued without exception. For Kant, no rational or ethical person would make lying a universal principle since, by so doing, the very fabric of society --- in terms of trust and honesty --- would break down totally and irrevocably. For this reason, Plato argues that there must exist an "honor code" even among thieves. Just as thieves prefer to sleep at night without worrying about getting ripped-off, so too proprietors expect to be paid without worrying about customers taking advantage of a clerical error. Ultimately, economics works on trust, or it doesn't work at all.
Which brings me to the point: One does what is right, ethically speaking, not because of the consequences of an action but on account of the rightness of the action itself. Whether or not your friends agree or disagree that you should pay those un-processed finance charges is irrelevant. (It is also irrelevant whether 51% of the voting public believes that the world is flat. Thinking something does not make it so, nor does "four out of five dentists surveyed" determine the moral rightness or wrongness of an action or government policy.)
Your question, to my mind, poses the following ethical conundrum: By not paying the finance charges that I agreed to pay ---regardless of whether or not they are properly processed --- do I become more authentically the kind of person I take myself to be? I made a commitment to a vendor and signed my name. Ethically speaking, that is as good as a handshake (and even better, in some places). Hence, the question I need to ask myself in this situation is this: Is the order of social fabric strengthened by my not fulfilling a particular responsibility that I freely took upon myself, namely, to pay for the products and services I buy? Would I "will" that every person also not pay for the services they agree to purchase? Can I call myself "virtuous" when I do not practice virtue? Likewise, can I call myself honest if I tell a "little white lie" (in this case, lie of omission) every once and again, especially if it doesn't (seemingly) hurt anyone?
Pay the charges for the services with which you were provided. That is what you set-out to do before your friends tried totake you down the "What's in it for me?" road. That's what you agreed to do, that's what you signed the dotted line to do, that's what yousaid you were going to do. To try to get out of your commitment because the charges were never processed is a little like saying that it's okay to cheat as long as your spouse or significant other fails to notice your repeated acts of infidelity. St. Augustine, who knew a little bit about ethics, warned that, when "you" become the end of everything, then that is the end of you! Acting as if I am the Center of the University may work to my advantage when I am eight or even ten years old; but hopefully I will have grown out of that by the time I reach fifteen. Or twenty. Or forty-five. Judging the rightness or wrongness of an action by "whether I can get away with it" may sadly be our new national mantra. But it isn't ethical. Ethics is about doing what is right, regardless of the consequences and in spite of the attractive principles that promulgate such variant myths of self-interest. Otherwise we really do live and die by the sword
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