Sellers will provide safety if consumers demand it.

Criticism Assumption of perfectly competitive market Buyers: do not have adequate information not rational about risk Most markets are oligopolies or monopolies Markets alone cannot provide adequate consumer protection Consumers must be protected through the legal structures of government and Voluntary initiatives of responsible business people Unpredictability’s duty duty turner’s to protect protect to consumer Consumers Consumer’s duty to to protected etc interest interest 3 Ethical Theories on MFC.Contract View 2 Due Care Theory 3 Social Costs View Contract View Business Sales Contract Consumer Free agreement Basic duty – Comply with terms of agreement Kant Rails C] Misrepresent] Misrepresentation in concoction tracts cannot cannot be be tracts universalism. Retreats Treats people people as means and and not not means ends If misrepresenmisrepresentation were were not taxation prohibited, fear of deception deception of would make make solicitously TTY feel less less feel free to to enter enter confrere 4 Moral Duties to Consumers 1 Duty to Comply 2 Duty to Disclose Duty Not to Misrepresent 4 Duty Not to Coerce Duty to Comply 0 Most basic duty CLC Provide a product that lives up to the claims the firm made about the product C] Moral view incorporated in laws C] Implied agreement Product Quality Variable C] Reliability 0 Probability that a product will function as the consumer is led to expect.CLC Service Life 0 Period of time during which the product will function as effectively as the consumer is let to expect it will function. L] Maintainability C] The ease with which the product can be repaired and kept in operating condition. Product Safety Duty to Disclose CLC Seller has a duty to disclose exactly what the customer is buying and what the terms of the sale are.

C] Duty to inform CLC Principle: an agreement is free only to the extent that one knows what alternatives are available.Freedom depends on knowledge Contractual transactions must be based on an open exchange of information. If consumers had to bargain for such information, the resulting contract would hardly be free. Duty Not to Misrepresent C] False information, deception C] Renders freedom of choice impossible Principle: Free choice is an essential ingredient of a ending contract, intentionally misrepresenting the nature of commodity is ethically wrong.

Duty Not to Coerce C] When a seller takes advantage of a buyer’s fear or emotional stress to extract consent to an agreement. 0 Buyer would not make such decision if he/she was thinking rationally. CLC Using duress or undue influence to coerce. C] Seller has duty not to take advantage of the buyer’s ability to make free rational choices. C] unrealistic assumptions C] Assumes manufacturers make direct agreements with consumers.

ј Argument: indirect agreements ? advertisementsC] Sellers can remove all their duties to buyers (disclaimers) D Consumer and seller are equals C] Doctrine: caveat emptor – buyer beware Due Care Theory sellers Sellers Manufacturers are in a more advantaged position, they have a duty to take special care to ensure that consumers interests are not harmed by the products that they offer them Doctrine: caveat emptor C] buyer beware (Contract View) them. Doctrine: caveat vendor C] seller beware Exercise due care to prevent others from being injured. Foresee possible injuries.Edgar Scheme Vulnerability of the client led to development of proof. Ode of ethics Agents have moral duty not to harm or injure other parties Ethics of care Kant & Rails People should be treated as ends and not merely as means Would provide basis for a secure social environment Due care Theory 0 Manufacturers exercise sufficient care only when they take adequate steps to prevent whatever injurious effects they can foresee.

C] If injury sustained could not have been possibly foreseen manufacturers are not morally negligent.