英検1級2次試験：Can businesses be ethical and profitable?

Can businesses be ethical and profitable?

(企業は倫理的でありながら収益を上げることができるのか？)

I’m against the view that businesses can be ethical and profitable.

I have two reasons to support my opinion.

First, mass media companies make a lot of money by doing various things that are unethical. They often sensationalize news stories in order to increase the number of viewers or readers. For example, many mass media companies exaggerated the side effects of the vaccine for COVID-19. Some of them even said, “This is so harmful because it damages genetic information.”. This kind of reports often mislead people into wrong direction.

Second, some manufactures often do horrible things just to make profits. For example, one of the largest automobile companies in Japan didn’t report the details about serious accidents caused by company’s mistakes to the government properly. Also, the company fabricated the data regarding safety standards. As a result of them, in 2002, one of the tires of a truck suddenly came off, and 3 people were killed and injured.

Considering these two examples, I don’t believe that businesses can be both ethical and profitable. (173 words)

【内容の要約】

結論：Disagree

①マスコミによる過剰な報道

②自動車メーカーによる不正問題

他にも、残業代の未払い等といった具体例を使うこともできそうですね。

勿論、企業倫理を守りながら収益を上げている企業もたくさんあるとは思いますが、今回は敢えて「収益を上げるためには倫理面の犠牲が伴う」という立場で文章を作ってみました。