Friedman fallacies

Journal of Business Ethics 10 (12):907 - 914 (1991)
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Abstract

Milton Friedman's article, The Social Responsibility of Business Is To Increase Its Profits, owes its appeal to the rhetorical devices of simplicity, authority, and finality. More careful consideration reveals oversimplification and ambiguity that conceals empirical errors and logical fallacies. It is false that business does, or would, operate exclusively in economic terms, that managers concentrate obsessively on profitability, and that ethics can be marginalized. These errors reflect basic contradictions: an apolitical political base, altruistic agents of selfishness, and good deriving from greed.

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Citations of this work

Does Milton Friedman Support a Vigorous Business Ethics?Christopher Cosans - 2009 - Journal of Business Ethics 87 (3):391-399.
Libertarian theories of the corporate and global capitalism.Denis G. Arnold - 2003 - Journal of Business Ethics 48 (2):155-173.
A model of business ethics.Göran Svensson & Greg Wood - 2008 - Journal of Business Ethics 77 (3):303 - 322.
A Model of Business Ethics.Göran Svensson & Greg Wood - 2008 - Journal of Business Ethics 77 (3):303-322.

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