The Issue Itself
Many people have heard of Bernie Madoff and the Ponzi scheme
that he ran which was said to be the biggest in U.S. history. But many people do not know how he started or
what he did to actually be one of the prestige firms on Wall Street. During his early years he attended the
University of Alabama but one year later he transferred to Hofstra University
which was much closer to his home in Queens, New York. The next year, Madoff earned his bachelor's
degree in political science from Hofstra.
Madoff studied law at Brooklyn Law School but quit later that year to
start his own investment firm using $5000 to start it up which he saved from
his prior job of a lifeguard and a side job installing sprinkler systems. With the help of is father-in-law Madoff and
his wife started Madoff Investment Securities, LLC. Madoff was able to pull in big time clients
like Stephen Spielberg and Kevin Bacon.
Madoff Investment Securities grew famous for its reliable annual returns
of 10 percent or more and, by the 1980s, his firm handled up to 5 percent of
the trading on the New York Stock Exchange.
Madoff planned on giving out a few million dollar bonus
checks two months earlier than scheduled and immediately his two sons questioned
where all of the money came from. He
then admitted to them that a branch of his firm was actually an elaborate Ponzi
scheme. Madoff's sons reported their father to federal authorities, and the
next day Madoff was arrested and charged with securities fraud. Madoff also reportedly told investigators
that he lost $50 billion dollars of his investors’ money and pled guilty to 11
felony charges including securities fraud, investment adviser fraud, mail
fraud, wire fraud, three counts of money laundering, false statements, perjury,
false filings with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC),
and theft from an employee benefit plan.
To this day the extent of his fraud is still being uncovered and
prosecutors are saying that $170 billion moved through the principal Madoff
account over decades, and that before his arrest the firm's statements showed a
total of $65 billion in accounts. On
June 29, 2009 Madoff was sentenced to 150 years in prison which was the maximum
sentence.
Individualism
Individualism basically is the individual aspect of the
person meaning that the focus is on those individuals’ beliefs and goals rather
than a group or team. They promote the
individuals desires and self-interest as opposed to being group oriented and
really focusing on that individual. From
the individualists point of view in this particular case Bernie Madoff was
essentially right in what he was doing because he was doing what he had to
maximize his profit and to help the business become a success. However this can also be argued because in
Individualism, especially Friedman's definition be argued because in
Individualism, especially Friedman's definition of it, it states that the only
obligation that the business person has is to maximize profit for the owner or
the stockholders. So clearly Madoff was
not maximizing profit for his stockholders in fact he was deliberately taking
their money and actually losing them a lot more than they thought. Going back to just himself he was able to
accomplish a lot for the company even if it was illegal. He was able to make many billions of dollars
not only for himself but his entire family who worked for him as well. Individualism also states that your top
priority should be to maximize your own profit and to make sure that you are
put above all else. So if you look at it
in that sense Madoff was just trying to look after himself and provide himself
with a better life which is technically right in the eyes of an individualist. In the end, he did what he thought would
benefit him the most and for that he is correct.
Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism basically states that by doing what is morally
right will benefit the most amount of people and generate the greatest amount
of happiness. So in other words doing
what is right should be placed above all else.
I think it is safe to say that Bernie Madoff stood for everything that
utilitarianism is against. For example,
by running his massive Ponzi scheme he was not thinking about how the people he
was taking money from were feeling he just wanted it all for himself no matter
how many people he had to step on to get it.
As you can see Madoff was not interested in doing the right thing at all
and because of this he let a lot of people down and caused a lot of unhappiness
because of it. If he were to do the
right thing he would not be in jail right now and even if he couldn't make the
amount he was making illegally he would still be making a good amount and it
would all be clean instead of taken unwillingly from others.
Kantianism
Kantianism says that all actions are performed with some type
of overlying principle. Going off of
this Kant himself believed that everyone is a fundamentally rational
being. He went on to say that any action
that is not rational cannot in any way be a good act no matter what that act
may be. The formula of humanity says
that a rational person should never be treated as a means but as an end. This principle can be applied to this
particular case by simply asking the question of was what Madoff did
rational? This could easily be argued
but personally I feel that it was not rational at all. This is because even when he was running the
Ponzi scheme and everything was going great he must have known eventually
someone would catch on and find out everything he was doing. He was not making rational decisions and
because of it he paid price. This case
proves Kant's point because he stated that any act that is not rational cannot
be a good act in any way. This applies
perfectly to this case because although Madoff might have thought that he could
outsmart everyone it was only a matter of time before he was caught.
Virtue Theory
The four main virtue theories that are looked at heavily are
courage, honesty, temperance and justice.
Looking at these in the perspective of Bernie Madoff I would say that he
has some of these traits. For instance,
although what he did was very wrong he did have courage to actually go through
with it and make it happen. He also has
temperance because he knew the whole time what could happen or what could go
wrong so he was ready at all times for the worst. He knew what as at stake and what he could
lose but he still kept pursuing his business.
However, there are many things that he can improve on starting with
honesty. He lied to countless people’s
faces and deliberately stole money right from underneath them. This whole situation could have been avoided
if he simply did this the right and honest way the first time around. Another thing he can improve on is
justice. He did not do what was morally
right once throughout this entire process and because of it, it all caught up
to him which is why he is in jail for the rest of his life now. 
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