Dictionary.com defines “ethics” as that branch of philosophy dealing with values relating to human conduct, with respect to the rightness and wrongness of certain actions.

Based on that definition, Bernard Madoff, charged with running a fifty billion dollar ponzi scheme isn’t unethical.  Really.  Truly.

There was a very interesting article in Tuesday’s Financial Times, the third newspaper I read each day… yes, newspaper.  I don’t read papers online, I like the real thing, the fold in the middle, the ink on my fingers.

Anyways…

The FT article, titled “Off the Fairway” told about an Interbourse golf tournament held last May on the tip of Mexico’s Baja peninsula.  Mr. Madoff was a participant in the tournament, and some speculated that something was amiss.  Were they concerned with his “stellar returns”?  No, they thought he was lying about his golf handicap, understating his skill to be in a better position to win a prize.  One participant said…

“It makes a difference if your handicap is the right or wrong one.  I always had the impression that he was playing off a 14 or a 15“.  However, according to the Golf Handicap and Information Network, his actual handicap was 9.8.  “He wasn’t altogether straightforward“.

Now I’m comfortable that Mr. Madoff didn’t really need one of the prizes that was being given away, whether another gold watch, a couple nights at a resort, or a complimentary dinner at a five-star restaurant… based on having a couple of billion dollars of other people’s money floating around.

This wasn’t an issue of right or wrong, not a matter of ethics or morals.  Mr. Madoff wasn’t being unethical, he wasn’t even a man of moral depravity (a state of mind the opposite of that which we are bound to be in). Both concepts require an understanding of right or wrong.

You can often get an idea of how someone will treat kids they may have in the future based on how they treat their parents, or their dog. I guess cheating at golf is the new “leading indicator” for lying and stealing in business.