Jan Strickland

Would you ever tell a lie? Would you ever cheat? Do you ever push the line just a little? Have you ever leaned just enough to change the balance? Your first thought may be “no”, but studies in both economics and the social sciences suggest otherwise. It just depends on the incentive, or better said—everybody has their price. That’s not to say we might not cheat for a good cause; we often manage to rationalize it as nobility but that doesn’t change the game. A rose, is a rose, is a rose… For most people it’s not like taking a gun and committing a robbery, it’s more like fifty shades of gray. I submit to you that this is generally how corporate fraud occurs.”One toe over the line.” Actually, it’s easier to catch the guy with the gun and put him in jail than to detect white collar crime AND white collar crimes generally merit less jail time. Still as Don Henley put it in his song, “you can steal more money with a briefcase than a gun.” “Empire Lost” explores this idea. It also deals with the idea that people feed on each other’s dishonesty. It talks about how you can know ‘without knowing’. Is that as bad as outright participating? How often do we look the other way, and isn’t this cheating just as much. Just a few musings for when you look in the mirror. What’s your price?