Those unethical rich

At a very busy four-way intersection with stop signs on all sides, study investigated how many and what kind of vehicles cut off other vehicles by crossing the intersection before waiting their turn in defiance of the California Vehicle Code.

Since cars are reasonable indicator of personal wealth, vehicle make, age, and appearance were used to estimate the social class of the driver.

The results were that 36% of highest-class drivers cut off other vehicles while less then 9% of lower class drivers decided to break the law so blatantly. More upper-class drivers cut off other vehicles at the intersection, regardless of the time of day, driver’s sex and age, or the amount of traffic.

In the follow-up study, vehicle make, age, and appearance were again used to estimate the social class of the driver. This time, however, researches measured the probability of cutting off pedestrians at a crosswalk.

Cutting off pedestrians also violates California Vehicle Code. Still, about 45% of upper-class drivers decided to ignore people waiting to cross the road at the marked crossing, while only about 19% of lowest two classes of vehicles showed the same behavior.

In the third study, participants were asked to estimate how probable it is that they would engage in some shady dealings.

Similar to previous two studies, upper class individuals proved more likely to engage in unrightfully taking something or benefiting from something they were not entitled to.

This was one interesting study. While waiting for the “test,” participants were exposed to the jar of candies that were supposedly intended for children participating in studies in a nearby laboratory. They were told that they could help themselves to some if they wanted.

It was clear that taking any candy would reduce the number of candies that children will receive. Still, participants ranked in the upper class took far more candy than those ranked in the lower class. Taking about stealing candies from the kids...

In this study, participants were given a task of interviewing job candidates. Among other things, they were informed that the specific position will be eliminated very soon, but that the candidate, who desired to maintain the job for 2 years, was not aware of this.

Study proved that upper class participants were less likely to tell the job candidate the truth about job stability. Lower class participants tended to be honest and tell the candidates that this was definitely not a long-term job.

This study required participants to report the total of five, computer generated, “random” dice rolls. What they didn’t know was the fact that computer generated exact same rolls for all participants and that the total was always 12.

Upper class participants usually ended up reporting a total higher than 12. The funny thing is that they tried to cheat knowing that the main prize was only a $50 gift certificate.

What’s interesting for this study is that researchers used Amazon’s MTurk to recruit participants.

In this study, participants were asked to state how likely they were to engage in some truly unethical behaviors at work like stealing cash, receiving bribes or overcharging customers.

Again, upper class participants reported preference for more unethical behavior than lower class participants did.

This study also showed that if participants were first exposed to positive aspects of greed, lower class participants showed high levels of unethical behavior. If first told that greed is good, lower class participants ended up behaving comparable to their upper class counterparts.

It seems that the main indicator of possible unethical behavior is your basic attitude to greed. The fact remains that most of the rich people are greedy too.

“It is more difficult for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God than it is for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle.”
- The New Testament, Luke 18:25

In the end, one of the conclusions of these studies was that altruism is hard to find amongst the rich and greedy. In the words of researchers:

“We reason that increased resources and independence from others cause people to prioritize self-interest over others’ welfare and perceive greed as positive and beneficial, which in turn gives rise to increased unethical behavior.”