Ethical Dilemma- Analysis of the News Term Paper

Ethical Dilemma- Analysis of the News - Term Paper Example As discussed above, the primary ethical decision maker or EDM is Apple Inc., and the ethical dilemma concerns the plight of the workers in the subcontracting firms who manufacture Apple products such as the iPhone, Worker welfare is weighed against the benefits to the American and global consumer of the computing products themselves, and the value of Apple’s economic activity to the American and global economy. The dilemma springs from issues relating to worker welfare, including low wages, the repetitive nature of the work, long work hours, and low wages. The confluence of these and other factors drive workers to take their own lives. In Cooper (2013) we get a sense of the gravity of the condition from the presence of nets around the iPhone manufacturing facilities to prevent more workers from jumping to their deaths. This is in stark contrast to the large profits that Apple makes and the large market capitalization of the firm due to that. Because Apple is rewarded for profi ts and for great products, Apple has every incentive to keep costs down, and that drive to depress costs lead to subcontractors depressing wages and other worker-related costs on the other end. These are conflicting interests that are stacked against workers and their interests, especially considering that workers have little by way of leverage in the entire process. The supply of workers is large, relative to demand, and so Apple subcontractors are able to dictate wages and living conditions in the shops. Subcontractors in turn are pressured to depress wages in order to make margins out of low contract bids. In a most general sense, the entire market is involved, because market forces that have contributed to this state of affairs where workers are awarded the least wages possible to squeeze maximum profits from their efforts (Johnson, 2011). B. Possible Alternative Courses of Action In a perfect world Apple will settle for lower profit margins for their products and lower profits all in all in exchange for fairer wages for workers and higher costs for producing their products. Ideally, this translates to subcontractors being able to pay their workers higher wages, and secure better working conditions for them all in all, by being able to bid for the manufacturing work at higher overall bid prices. This translates to the