Because with large companies, blame and accountability gets spread thin over a wide area till it evaporates, so everyone gets away with it.
Ultimately the CEO is responsible. To me it doesn't even matter if the CEO knows about it or not, if not the company has poor governance which is the CEOs full responsibility. Wirecard CEO has been arrested since 2020, will probably sit for another 10 years.
Wirecard CEO was proven beyond reasonable doubt that he personally was involved in large-scale fraud.
They have kind of abandoned diesel engines, which the whole scandal was based around. It became clear that it would be impossible to create diesel engines which would comply with enviromental standards, which is a shame since they are more efficient and it is consumers who are losing out. They are still one of the main automotive conglomerations today. If anything American car companies are losing the market in Europ…
I could be wrong but I think BMW and Mercedes still make diesel engines. So maybe it's only impossible at a lower price point? Although the difference isn't that large.
They have kind of abandoned diesel engines, which the whole scandal was based around. It became clear that it would be impossible to create diesel engines which would comply with enviromental standards, which is a shame since they are more efficient and it is consumers who are losing out. They are still one of the main automotive conglomerations today. If anything American car companies are losing the market in Europ…
I could be wrong but I think BMW and Mercedes still make diesel engines. So maybe it's only impossible at a lower price point? Although the difference isn't that large.
Using [1], BMW have 87 models, of which 13 can be electric, 13 plug-in hybrid, 47 petrol and just 6 diesel. The six are all SUVs.
Mercedes don't have an easy filter, but they do have some cars available with diesel engines, e.g. C-Class.
Diesel is now down to 9.5% of new cars sold in Europe (Q1 2025), less than full EVs ([2]).
We would see some world change finally if this became the norm. Breaking the law in a corporate suit shouldn't be any different than breaking the law as a soldier or citizen. Corporations have been doing war crimes on us for quite some time now.
Stealing from employees is just normal business in the US. $1.5 billion in stolen wages were recovered for US workers between 2021 and 2023. Imagine how much wasn't recovered. It is often the least able to take action/most in need of every dollar of their income that are stolen from. You can tell a lot about a society by how it treats those with the least power versus those with power. https://www.epi.org/publication…
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That isn't theft.
If an employee completes all the work assigned to them and passes performance reviews then what you're describing is a suboptimal use of the employees on the part of the employer.
Good for Germany, but it is all too rare to see bad corporate behaviour punished like this. Steal £10k from a company, and you will probably go to prison for a long time. Start a company and steal billions from your customers and/or the tax payer, and you will probably get away with it. I believe Iceland was the only country to jail bankers after the 2008 banking disaster. We are still waiting for the British governm…
At least something came out of it. In 08, all the executives that tanked our economy retired and are enjoying manors in the Hampton and socialize in country clubs on Long Island. Cheney, an oil executive, started a war based on lies when he landed in the highest office of the land, and now owns hundreds of acres in Wyoming based on oil profits Halliburton extracted (and paid him as a consultant for 5years after his VP position, whatever that means). I wish we did a better job in the US sending our criminals to prison, but I guess a neoliberal capitalist society will always favor a) high fines over justice for white collar crimes, b) as little attention as possible, given a supposedly free media can make a raucous encore and draw more attention. It is a facet of the trade.
Because with large companies, blame and accountability gets spread thin over a wide area till it evaporates, so everyone gets away with it.
Ultimately the CEO is responsible. To me it doesn't even matter if the CEO knows about it or not, if not the company has poor governance which is the CEOs full responsibility. Wirecard CEO has been arrested since 2020, will probably sit for another 10 years.
The question is should the CEO have know. A CEO that trys to set a culture of doing the right thing, with training on what the right thing is, and other such things can still be deceived by someone low level who cheats. It is possible for one person to cover their tracks for a long time if they are trying to cheat. It can be years to track down who is doing the immoral thing even after you catch something is wrong.
The question this is this one person (or small group) operating against their instructions, or is it the CEO encouraging people to cheat? That can be a hard question, but we want CEOs to think if I do "enough" (whatever that is) to ensure we obey the law I'm okay and thus I want to ensure enough is done. There are always crooks in the world, we want to ensure they are not encourged. If the CEO is always at fault their thought is likely to go to how can I ensure that tracks are covered so they nobody can be convicted.
That isn't theft. If an employee completes all the work assigned to them and passes performance reviews then what you're describing is a suboptimal use of the employees on the part of the employer.
Real theft by employees is also extremely common. Especially in retail and food service.
They have kind of abandoned diesel engines, which the whole scandal was based around. It became clear that it would be impossible to create diesel engines which would comply with enviromental standards, which is a shame since they are more efficient and it is consumers who are losing out. They are still one of the main automotive conglomerations today. If anything American car companies are losing the market in Europ…
In all fairness, in the general European perception, with the Cougar, the Puma, and the Focus, Ford is not really seen as an "American" brand. Especially the Focus has virtually nothing to do with what Europeans would consider 'an American car'. It is the quintessential low-to-mid-tier Eurocar: small, cheap, does what it is supposed to do. Compare that to e.g. Chevrolet, which tried - and failed - to get a foothold i…
Didn't Chevrolet just bought and rebranded some Korean automaker?