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6 votes
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The day the US TV industry died
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Podimo, the Denmark-based subscription service for podcasts and audiobooks, secures €58.6 million in funding
3 votes -
We spoke with the last person standing in the floppy disk business
11 votes -
Disney chief Bob Chapek sees clear path for Hulu to merge with Disney+ once Comcast buyout is complete
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Adobe in final talks to acquire Figma for $20B USD
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Patagonia founder gives away the company to fight climate change
26 votes -
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10 votes -
Paramount is considering shutting down Showtime and migrating its content to Paramount+
4 votes -
Bitwarden raises $100 million from PSG Equity
12 votes -
4,000 US Google cafeteria workers quietly unionized during the pandemic
12 votes -
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2 votes -
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6 votes -
Klarna has revealed that losses more than tripled in the first half of the year – firm has been hit by a slowdown in consumer spending
8 votes -
Once seen as experimental, a commercial wine industry in regions just below the Arctic circle is taking advantage of the warmer summers
5 votes -
How Mondragon became the world’s largest co-op
11 votes -
HBO Max and Warner Bros. Discovery seem to be on fire, and that's on purpose. The plan is to make a lot of money as cheaply as possible.
7 votes -
When it comes to flaunting its defense industry, Stockholm is shy – and it's hurting Swedish companies and handing lucrative contracts to competitors
4 votes -
Laid-off HBO Max execs reveal Warner Bros. Discovery is killing off diversity and courting ‘Middle America’
6 votes -
MoviePass to relaunch on Labor Day in beta form with pricing ranging from $10-$30 a month
11 votes -
Embracer Group, parent company for a vast and expanding roster of studios and publishers, goes on a spending spree buying up Middle-earth Enterprises and more
9 votes -
Rare earths processor Neo Performance Materials has bought exploration rights to mine in Greenland – diversifying supplies of minerals critical for advanced technologies
6 votes -
HBO Max to remove thirty-six titles, including twenty originals, from streaming
8 votes -
The rise of the worker productivity score
19 votes -
Buy a rural hospital for $100? Investors pick up struggling institutions for pennies
7 votes -
What Twitter’s move to shutter offices signals for Big Tech
11 votes -
I'm struggling with a potential ethical violation at work; feedback needed
I have a work-related ethics question, and I thought the fine people here on tildes were perfect to give feedback. I'll try to be brief but still give all of the information. Background I work for...
I have a work-related ethics question, and I thought the fine people here on tildes were perfect to give feedback. I'll try to be brief but still give all of the information.
Background
I work for an energy utility. This company isn't a charity, but it is a non-profit. We are owned by the people who buy power from us (called "members"). We don't profit off of the electricity we sell to our members, but we do generate extra electricity to sell to other utilities (mostly to for-profit ones). Any profit we make is either set aside for future use or is sent out to the members as a check. Yes, our members actually get a check each year. This cooperative was built to serve rural communities since at that point in history profit-driven companies weren't willing to spend the money to run electricity to these communities. We cover 90% (geographically) of our state, along with portions of a neighboring state. We generate using wind, hydro, solar, coal, and natural gas. I don't remember the exact numbers, but I believe roughly 30%-40% of our generation comes from renewables, and we now have a dedicated team researching nuclear power (SMNR) and energy storage (which would allow us to further shift to renewables).
Context
There is a PAC (an entity that throws money at politicians in exchange for votes) for rural electric cooperatives that we participate in. This PAC can only accept donations from our members or employees. While the stated purpose is to advocate for rural cooperatives in general, I personally think that largely translates into advocating for fossil fuels.
Every year there is a 10-day period in August where they start asking us employees to donate. Anyone can donate at any time, this is just the time that they emphasize it. Leadership has REPEATEDLY emphasized that there is no pressure and that our supervisors can't see who has and hasn't donated. I've been here nearly five years, and they've said this each time. I know that under the previous CEO (he left ~10 years ago) there was pressure to donate, and that's probably why they emphasize this now.
Issue
I've discovered however that the leadership CAN see information on who has donated and how much. PAC donations are public information, and the names and amounts can be easily seen online if you know where to look. I do believe that my division leader didn't know this, though I can't really know whether the other leadership did or didn't. There's no way to know if any supervisors have looked at this data or made decisions on it. After I brought it up to my division leader he thanked me and said he will send this new information out to our division.
However, communicating this to the rest of the company is beyond his control. He's alerted the people who can do this but what they do is up to them. While my division doesn't really care who donates, I get the impression that other divisions feel differently. IT has a profoundly different culture than the rest of the company. Senior leaders say there's no pressure, but that's not neciserily the case for supervisors and managers. It's been implied to me that the teams that work in power production, transmission planning, etc still have expectations about donations.
What to do?
So here's the core ethics question: Is it unethical for senior leadership to withhold this new information about the visibility of donations from the rest of the company? The assurance of anonymity was intended to reassure us that there would be no retaliation for those who don't donate and that there would be no favoritism for those who do.
Is this just a small thing that's not really important? If this is an issue, how significant is it? It's obviously not "dumping toxic waste in the river" bad, but it still feels like it must have some level (or potential level) of impact. If this is an issue, what actions would you personally take? How much would you be willing to risk taking action on this?
Thanks in advance, I just want to do the right thing.
16 votes -
Amazon is acquiring iRobot
21 votes -
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3 votes -
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11 votes -
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11 votes -
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14 votes -
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18 votes -
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6 votes -
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9 votes -
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7 votes -
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27 votes -
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13 votes -
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8 votes -
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8 votes -
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18 votes -
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6 votes -
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17 votes -
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26 votes -
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13 votes -
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5 votes -
Universal Music Group becomes the permanent home of Frank Zappa estate
3 votes -
Swedish power utility Vattenfall considering building at least two new small nuclear reactors to deal with a projected rise in electricity consumption over the coming decades
5 votes