Morality of jobs and what am I supposed to DO for the rest of my days on this earth?

[Malcolm_McLean]

And if he does this on a regular basis, the customers will catch on and either take their custom elsewhere - some place that sells jumpers at cost-plus all year round - or else they will simply wait for the sales - the store will simply be empty of customers during the period of time that the jumpers are being sold at the higher price, while the customers either wait for the sale, or go to the other store down the street that doesn’t engage in this practice.

Again, it’s not the sale of the moment that matters; it’s the long-term relationships that you develop with your customers, that leads to success. If your customers know that you are looking out for them, they will return to you - if they think you are taking advantage of them, they’ll go elsewhere.

I’m sure that different businesses have different rules. However it is not possible to avoid all short-term pressures.
People buy illusions. One of the main rules of sales is “people buy people”. Whilst it is easier to sell good products than bad ones, only marginally so. A good salesman with a useless product will outsell a naive one with a good deal to offer.

 

[jmcrae]

I’m sure that different businesses have different rules. However it is not possible to avoid all short-term pressures.
People buy illusions. One of the main rules of sales is “people buy people”. Whilst it is easier to sell good products than bad ones, only marginally so. A good salesman with a useless product will outsell a naive one with a good deal to offer.

Well, it’s up to the customer to decide whether the product is “useless” or not - and it’s up to the salesman to explain in a coherent way why the product is useful, and what it is good for. And you’re right that an inexperienced salesman will often not communicate very well what the advantages of his good product are, since he might expect the thing to sell itself.

 

[Magicsilence]

Well, it’s up to the customer to decide whether the product is “useless” or not - and it’s up to the salesman to explain in a coherent way why the product is useful, and what it is good for. And you’re right that an inexperienced salesman will often not communicate very well what the advantages of his good product are, since he might expect the thing to sell itself.

Hmm, are you suggesting ‘buyer beware’?

Shouldn’t our Catholic Faith hold us to higher principles?

 

[Magicsilence]

No. The pursuit of profit is not immoral.

How so?

Initially a firm serves customers, and in doing so makes profit.

The pursuit of profit reverses the situation, where profit becomes the goal, and serving customers becomes the way in which it is done.

The focus is all wrong.

 

[Aramis]

TO answer the question of how to find a job that’s morally sound:

You can’t. You can find a job which will alow you to make morally sound choices. The job is almost always neutral.

When the boss isn’t, however, then one should consider if the boss is also unlawful in actions… in my case, both times, the immoral employer was also committing unlawful acts. And in both cases, a quick complaint to the relevant agency resulted in swift and brutal action by the state. In both cases, I left as well.

 

[Contarini]

I graduate from university in Summer 2008, and am finding it morally taxing to think about what kind of a job would be pleasing to the Lord.

Most, if not all major/minor businesses are focused on profit maximisation and therefore (at least indirectly) serving the Devil , and as an employee it would be expected that one work towards the same goal (the nature of a capitalist society rewards those that increase shareholder value with higher pay etc…).

When the very basis of potential work environments is morally bankrupt, can one really work there with a clear conscience? Where are we, as Christians, supposed to go? Self - employment? Surely it is not a universal panacea?

It seems being a Catholic and having a job that pays enough to eat and sleep somewhere are awfully incompatible in this day and age.

If anyone has any suggestions, or advice, it’d be greatly appreciated.

In Jesus Christ,

What’s wrong with self-employment?

I’ll bet there are lots of jobs you could find that are using financial skills to help people rather than simply to make profit. For starters, you could look for a position working for the Church. My father-in-law spent years as a financial administrator for the United Methodist Church, and he saw this as a ministry. Or there are lots of charitable/humanitarian organizations that need good management/accounting professionals.

If you are really just interested in putting food on the table, and thus are willing to take a job with fairly low pay, it shouldn’t be impossible to find one.

Also, bear in mind that many of us wind up doing something rather different from what our college majors may have prepared us for. If you have good financial skills, I think you should be able to find a job with some kind of organization that is not primarily interested in money but is delighted to have a well-educated, intelligent, financially savvy employee who is idealistic and moral.

Edwin

 

[vern_humphrey]

Hmm, are you suggesting ‘buyer beware’?

Please don’t put words into people’s mouths.

Shouldn’t our Catholic Faith hold us to higher principles?

Yes – particularly in debate, when we should allow people to explain their own positions (and jmcrae’s post was quite clear) without spinning their posts to make them appear to say what they did not say.

 

[rr1213]

I graduate from university in Summer 2008, and am finding it morally taxing to think about what kind of a job would be pleasing to the Lord.

Most, if not all major/minor businesses are focused on profit maximisation and therefore (at least indirectly) serving the Devil , and as an employee it would be expected that one work towards the same goal (the nature of a capitalist society rewards those that increase shareholder value with higher pay etc…).

When the very basis of potential work environments is morally bankrupt, can one really work there with a clear conscience? Where are we, as Christians, supposed to go? Self - employment? Surely it is not a universal panacea?

It seems being a Catholic and having a job that pays enough to eat and sleep somewhere are awfully incompatible in this day and age.

If anyone has any suggestions, or advice, it’d be greatly appreciated.

In Jesus Christ,

Work for federal, state or local government.

 

[jmcrae]

Hmm, are you suggesting ‘buyer beware’?

No. What I am suggesting is that the customer is your real boss, regardless of who signs your pay cheque, and she’s the one who decides whether your product is worth buying or not - not you, and not your company.

Shouldn’t our Catholic Faith hold us to higher principles?

What could be a higher economic principle than freedom of choice?

 

[vern_humphrey]

Work for federal, state or local government.

Great Googlie Mooglie! He’s looking for a job that won’t offend his morals!

 

[kage_ar]

Great Googlie Mooglie! He’s looking for a job that won’t offend his morals!

You took the words right out of my mouth!!

 

[Al_Masetti]

There is another issue also.

When someone is looking for a first “real” job (full-time, with rent and car payments and paying school loans), then the concern should be finding an entry-level job that works.

It would be premature to worry about the morality of the rest of your life’s employment.

There are very few jobs that are really utterly immoral … maybe the accountant for a chain of abortion mills … [no joke; someone I know actually was offered that job.]

 

[rlg94086]

How so?

Initially a firm serves customers, and in doing so makes profit.

The pursuit of profit reverses the situation, where profit becomes the goal, and serving customers becomes the way in which it is done.

The focus is all wrong.

I thought you said you understand business.

The initial goal in starting a company is to make a profit by serving a need. If your focus is on serving your customer regardless of profit, you will not survive. Now, if you don’t serve your customer well, take care of your employees, etcetera, you won’t make the profit for very long; so the two are very intertwined. However, profit should never cease being the focus of a company.

The focus on profit becomes immoral only when it is made the end-all-be all. This quote from the Catechism is in regards to economic systems, but I believe it applies. As long as the business owner balances his need for profit with his Catholic duties as a businessman toward his employees, community, customers, etc. and his love for God, then he has not replaced God with “mammon.”

**2424 **A theory that makes profit the exclusive norm and ultimate end of economic activity is morally unacceptable. The disordered desire for money cannot but produce perverse effects. It is one of the causes of the many conflicts which disturb the social order.
A system that “subordinates the basic rights of individuals and of groups to the collective organization of production” is contrary to human dignity. Every practice that reduces persons to nothing more than a means of profit enslaves man, leads to idolizing money, and contributes to the spread of atheism. “You cannot serve God and mammon.”

I have just accepted a job with a manufacturers’ rep, which is very profitable. I know the owners, and while they don’t hold my religious conviction, they are very ethical in their approach to business. They also treat their employees well. After 5 years (more in the case of one), they are giving the two existing employees 5% ownership each in the company. They have offered the same to me after I complete 5 years with them. They are giving up part of their ownership because they recognize that having a stake in the company brings a different level of dedication and commitment. They also have a profit sharing plan that adds significantly to the retirement plan for everyone.

Now, I am being brought in to increase their territory and increase sales…and profit. If I am successful, I am compensated accordingly. If I am not successful, I won’t last long with the company. That’s the way it works. They know that I am a committed Catholic and fully accept that I will deal with principals and customers in a different manner because of my faith.

BTW…if I am successful, I will also make a lot of money. How I deal with that and my attitude towards that accumulation of wealth are what is at issue from a personal morality perspective.

 

[Magicsilence]

What’s wrong with self-employment?

I’ll bet there are lots of jobs you could find that are using financial skills to help people rather than simply to make profit. For starters, you could look for a position working for the Church. My father-in-law spent years as a financial administrator for the United Methodist Church, and he saw this as a ministry. Or there are lots of charitable/humanitarian organizations that need good management/accounting professionals.

If you are really just interested in putting food on the table, and thus are willing to take a job with fairly low pay, it shouldn’t be impossible to find one.

Also, bear in mind that many of us wind up doing something rather different from what our college majors may have prepared us for. If you have good financial skills, I think you should be able to find a job with some kind of organization that is not primarily interested in money but is delighted to have a well-educated, intelligent, financially savvy employee who is idealistic and moral.

Edwin

What a thoughtful post Edwin!

Indeed, one of the conclusions I came to initially was that working for the Church would be problem free, and being an accountant or similar within CAFOD, or the Life organisation would be fine. And self-employment is of course, an option.

But, I was curious as to what everyone else did in life.

With 1 billion answers there has to be some sort of a trend

 

[Magicsilence]

Please don’t put words into people’s mouths.

I asked a question regarding his position. There is a difference.

Yes – particularly in debate, when we should allow people to explain their own positions (and jmcrae’s post was quite clear) without spinning their posts to make them appear to say what they did not say.

I don’t know why you are deliberately picking a fight.

 

[Magicsilence]

No. What I am suggesting is that the customer is your real boss, regardless of who signs your pay cheque, and she’s the one who decides whether your product is worth buying or not - not you, and not your company.

Ok, so when the customer asks if your product is better than a competitors, and you know it is not, what do you say?

 

[Magicsilence]

There is another issue also.

When someone is looking for a first “real” job (full-time, with rent and car payments and paying school loans), then the concern should be finding an entry-level job that works.

It would be premature to worry about the morality of the rest of your life’s employment.

There are very few jobs that are really utterly immoral … maybe the accountant for a chain of abortion mills … [no joke; someone I know actually was offered that job.]

But you raise an important point with your example. The job is immoral because the ‘end’ of those ‘businesses’ is evil. Does this principle not carry across where profit maximisation occurs?

 

[Magicsilence]

I thought you said you understand business.

The initial goal in starting a company is to make a profit by serving a need. If your focus is on serving your customer regardless of profit, you will not survive. Now, if you don’t serve your customer well, take care of your employees, etcetera, you won’t make the profit for very long; so the two are very intertwined. However, profit should never cease being the focus of a company.

I disagree. Profit should not be the focus of the business, though it is, and will always remain necessary.

The focus on profit becomes immoral only when it is made the end-all-be all. This quote from the Catechism is in regards to economic systems, but I believe it applies. As long as the business owner balances his need for profit with his Catholic duties as a businessman toward his employees, community, customers, etc. and his love for God, then he has not replaced God with “mammon.”

But where someone HAS done this, can one morally work for that person?

I have just accepted a job with a manufacturers’ rep, which is very profitable. I know the owners, and while they don’t hold my religious conviction, they are very ethical in their approach to business. They also treat their employees well. After 5 years (more in the case of one), they are giving the two existing employees 5% ownership each in the company. They have offered the same to me after I complete 5 years with them. They are giving up part of their ownership because they recognize that having a stake in the company brings a different level of dedication and commitment. They also have a profit sharing plan that adds significantly to the retirement plan for everyone.

Now, I am being brought in to increase their territory and increase sales…and profit. If I am successful, I am compensated accordingly. If I am not successful, I won’t last long with the company. That’s the way it works. They know that I am a committed Catholic and fully accept that I will deal with principals and customers in a different manner because of my faith.

BTW…if I am successful, I will also make a lot of money. How I deal with that and my attitude towards that accumulation of wealth are what is at issue from a personal morality perspective.

But would your principles cause you to recommend another (competitors) ‘product’ because you knew objectively, it suited the customer better? Or would you remain silent? Which of these actions exemplifies the command to love our neighbour?

 

[seekerz]

Indeed, this is what I am trying to ask. When faced with these moral dilemmas, what are Catholics doing? Repeatedly getting fired?

Thankyou for this honest assessment!!

This is the essence of the problem. Faith in Christ compels us to condemn immoral activity, yet it is at the heart of so many activities, which means that it is inevitable any sort of complex, well payed work will be entangled within it.

Does it mean that Catholics over the world are denying their faith? Or working simple jobs? Or other?

Magicsilence, in practical terms it means that some people never move up the ladder because they don’t ‘do whatever it takes’; some do get fired on various pretexts, some actually get appreciated for their moral stances.

The point is, ultimately all work is an offering to God and should be done as unto Him. Therefore, HE is the one to concentrate on pleasing.

As you have implied, there is a lot of compromise by Christians in the world of work; there are also many people who really live their faith. Like you, when I see the moral dilemmas of certain occupations in which Catholics are well represented, I wonder whether there’s a disconnect between faith and work for some of us! The jobs themselves would not be classed as immoral but some practices routinely engaged in definitely are.

So I do understand the question you seem to be asking, where are those Christians who stand against immoral behavior or practices and pay the price? Maybe we just don’t hear about them, maybe they’re too few, maybe the more important question is not “Where are they” but “Will we be counted among them?”

 

[Magicsilence]

Magicsilence, in practical terms it means that some people never move up the ladder because they don’t ‘do whatever it takes’; some do get fired on various pretexts, some actually get appreciated for their moral stances.

The point is, ultimately all work is an offering to God and should be done as unto Him. Therefore, HE is the one to concentrate on pleasing.

As you have implied, there is a lot of compromise by Christians in the world of work; there are also many people who really live their faith. Like you, when I see the moral dilemmas of certain occupations in which Catholics are well represented, I wonder whether there’s a disconnect between faith and work for some of us! The jobs themselves would not be classed as immoral but some practices routinely engaged in definitely are.

So I do understand the question you seem to be asking, where are those Christians who stand against immoral behavior or practices and pay the price? Maybe we just don’t hear about them, maybe they’re too few, maybe the more important question is not “Where are they” but “Will we be counted among them?”

Thankyou for this great post!

Do you have any personal practical experience on the subject matter? Or suggestions of possible job areas?

I really appreciate your insight!

In Jesus Christ,