Enron is not the only company in recent years to surprise the nation with the extents of fraud a company with poor ethical practices can get away with. Bernie Ebbers was a former basketball coach who bought a long distance phone company and became its CEO. After two years he combined his company with two others to become WorldCom. Less than 10 years later after becoming one the top long distance companies in the world WorldCom took over MCI in the biggest corporate takeover in America’s history. WorldCom continued buying many smaller companies in its field. However, eventually they began warning their earnings were going to miss estimates. The following year these misses were lower. Ebbers personal fortune was sunk by the huge debt from loans he paid with WorldCom stock. Ebbers is eventually forced to retire as CEO. Afterwards, WorldCom is forced to reveal artificially inflated profits of almost 4 billion (Black, 25). This scandal sends the stock market prices to their lowest numbers in years. Other accounting irregularities are found, 17,000 employees are let off as well (Black, 25). Many experts called this “one of the worst cases of accounting fraud ever” (Black, 25). This was all caused by a simple accounting switch that anyone with an accounting degree would have been able to notice. After experiencing these demonstrations of corporate-wide immorality, it makes us think about the kind ethics college students are entering the workforce with. A “NAS/Zogby Poll of College Seniors” gave a national survey of students randomly selected (Ethics, Enron, and American Higher Education). When respondents were asked whether their classes in college had prepared them to act ethically in their jobs 97% said yes (Ethics, Enron, and American Higher Education). However, when asked to choose which profession in college encourages unethical behavior for success, 28% agreed it was business (Ethics, Enron, and American Higher Education). 57% of people majoring in business or accounting chose this answer (Ethics, Enron, and American Higher Education). The expectations of people entering the business world from universities are not indicative of a personal focus in ethics. Almost three fourths of the people polled also said that ethics were an individual choice (Ethics, Enron, and American Higher Education). Colleges just aren’t teaching their students that ethics are an integral part of a good working business. The accountants and finance managers at WorldCom certainly picked profit over ethics, but it achieved them nothing accept failure in the end.

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