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Dinner is bribery? I can see how it would be bribery if the cancer researcher made a campaign donation after dinner, or left a suitcase of cash under the table,

Dinner is bribery? I can see how it would be bribery if the cancer researcher made a campaign donation after dinner, or left a suitcase of cash under the table, or even paid for dinner, but simply having dinner is not bribery. I agree that conflating these terms leads to less productive conversations.

serf 4y ago
>Dinner is bribery? it very well could be. I know plenty of people that could be persuaded to do things by the mere chance to meet someone that they adore. 'Dinner' is often just code for "let me introduce you to X business associate", which has definite real-world persuasive power for people that need to make those connections. It would be unsurprising for an oil-tycoon to try to purchase a plate at a dinner with lots of oil-state-politicians. This isn't for the sake of good company, it's to further business interests.
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Ekaros 4y ago
If we had proper standards of course it would be bribery. Offering anything with economic value should be considered such. Dinner, cup of coffee, campaign donation, lucrative position after stay in office, drugs, money, gold. All should be treated exactly same and result in extremely lengthy sentences in prison.
gaganyaan 4y ago
Yes, dinner is very much bribery if the bribee doesn't pay for it. Even though I skip past those annoying HR trainings as much as possible, I still gathered that much from them.
candiddevmike 4y ago
A lot of companies forbid employees from having vendor-paid for lunches, among many other restrictive anti-bribery policies. I'd go so far as to say private companies are more ruthless about this than the government. Ironically enough, I'm pretty sure these companies do a lot of lobbying.
bastawhiz 4y ago
Every company I've worked at has had compliance trainings, and free dinner is always listed as a form of bribery that needs to be run past the compliance team.

serf 4y ago

>Dinner is bribery? it very well could be. I know plenty of people that could be persuaded to do things by the mere chance to meet someone that they adore. 'Dinner' is often just code for "let me introduce you to X business associate", which has definite real-world persuasive power for people that need to make those connections. It would be unsurprising for an oil-tycoon to try to purchase a plate at a dinner with lots of oil-state-politicians. This isn't for the sake of good company, it's to further business interests.

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Ekaros 4y ago

If we had proper standards of course it would be bribery. Offering anything with economic value should be considered such. Dinner, cup of coffee, campaign donation, lucrative position after stay in office, drugs, money, gold. All should be treated exactly same and result in extremely lengthy sentences in prison.

gaganyaan 4y ago

Yes, dinner is very much bribery if the bribee doesn't pay for it. Even though I skip past those annoying HR trainings as much as possible, I still gathered that much from them.

candiddevmike 4y ago

A lot of companies forbid employees from having vendor-paid for lunches, among many other restrictive anti-bribery policies. I'd go so far as to say private companies are more ruthless about this than the government. Ironically enough, I'm pretty sure these companies do a lot of lobbying.

bastawhiz 4y ago

Every company I've worked at has had compliance trainings, and free dinner is always listed as a form of bribery that needs to be run past the compliance team.