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What I'm curious about is where the legal line lands on social proof arbitrage. For example, lying about competing offers-- for jobs or funding-- is generally

What I'm curious about is where the legal line lands on social proof arbitrage. For example, lying about competing offers-- for jobs or funding-- is generally considered ethical, insofar as social status inflation and self-promotion fall into the "everyone does it, and most people have to" bucket. (Is it legal? No idea. But few consider it unethical.) If you know an employer does a lot of back-channel reference checks, you absolutely should use a fake competing offer (if you don't have a real one) to put time pressure on them. On the other hand, the article cites cases in which lying about a competing offer is illegal (and also, for those cases, unethical). The weird, queasy line is that it seems to be illegal (and generally considered unethical) to lie about a product, whereas lying about yourself (i.e. "you are the product") is ethical, legal, garden-variety social status inflation-- except surrounding official, factual credentials where higher standards must be imposed (e.g., as in law and medicine).

nostrademons 12y ago
Lying about yourself is generally considered unethical as well. It usually doesn't get you prosecuted (unless you lie to the government for a security clearance or something), but it can and probably will get you fired if your employer finds out, and there have been some high-profile firings in that regard. I think your confusion comes from the difference between "lying about facts" vs. "telling a story". Facts are things that are independently verifiable - things like your dates & places of employment, degrees conferred, job titles, salary, etc. There are varying degrees of consequences for lying about these - typically, lying about your salary gets at most a little distrust, while lying about your degrees can get you fired - and you can always simply refuse to answer or provide those facts, but lying about them is almost always considered unethical. However, how you tell the facts is your story, and you can and should paint that in the most positive light. For example, "founder" of a product is usually a complicated title because of the twists and turns all ideas go through. It could legitimately be used to refer to the person who came up with the idea, the person who did the first workable implementation of the idea, the person who first realized an idea was a viable business, the person who contributed the bulk of the money toward making the idea a viable business, the founder of another organization that merged early on into the business in question, etc. And there are famous people who fit into all of those categories - Elon Musk, for example, basically never did the work of reducing an idea to a workable implementation, but he is credited with founding multiple companies where the heavy engineering lifting is done by others. Steve Jobs mostly contributed money and cheerleading to Pixar, but is widely considered a founder of that company.
- sheepmullet 12y ago
  "There are varying degrees of consequences for lying about these - typically, lying about your salary gets at most a little distrust" Because it is an incredibly gray area. For example I currently get 6 weeks annual leave and very generous medical. If I'm applying at a place that only offers 2 weeks annual leave and limited medical then when they ask my current salary I'm going to add these benefits based on their equivalent cash value. For example I earn ~$2k/wk and so the extra annual leave is worth $8k/year. And to get the equivalent medical would cost me around $10k/year. So I'm going to happily add $18k to my current salary. Likewise I don't feel it is unethical to adjust for cost of living differences between countries and cities. For example if moving to San Francisco for work I would need to be paid about 20% more just to maintain my current income. I don't think talking in purchasing power instead of nominal is unethical. Etc etc etc.
Joeri 12y ago
I don't see how lying about anything could be considered ethical. It may be socially acceptable to lie about yourself, but that doesn't make it ethical. Plenty of things that are socially acceptable are in fact profoundly unethical. So, the line is in fact very simple: if you are an ethical person, you never lie. Update: however, upon reflection, society forces us into practical considerations. If you avoid lying you will be taken advantage of because you weaken your position in society. For that reason, while lying is never ethical, it is sometimes the only realistic alternative. You may for example have people lying about being hiv-positive to get a job. There is no rational reason in many job categories to reject such an applicant, but in practice they won't get a job if they tell the truth. I also would make an exception for withholding the whole truth. Sometimes people have the right not to know things which would only hurt their feelings and bring no practical benefit.

nostrademons 12y ago

Lying about yourself is generally considered unethical as well. It usually doesn't get you prosecuted (unless you lie to the government for a security clearance or something), but it can and probably will get you fired if your employer finds out, and there have been some high-profile firings in that regard. I think your confusion comes from the difference between "lying about facts" vs. "telling a story". Facts are things that are independently verifiable - things like your dates & places of employment, degrees conferred, job titles, salary, etc. There are varying degrees of consequences for lying about these - typically, lying about your salary gets at most a little distrust, while lying about your degrees can get you fired - and you can always simply refuse to answer or provide those facts, but lying about them is almost always considered unethical. However, how you tell the facts is your story, and you can and should paint that in the most positive light. For example, "founder" of a product is usually a complicated title because of the twists and turns all ideas go through. It could legitimately be used to refer to the person who came up with the idea, the person who did the first workable implementation of the idea, the person who first realized an idea was a viable business, the person who contributed the bulk of the money toward making the idea a viable business, the founder of another organization that merged early on into the business in question, etc. And there are famous people who fit into all of those categories - Elon Musk, for example, basically never did the work of reducing an idea to a workable implementation, but he is credited with founding multiple companies where the heavy engineering lifting is done by others. Steve Jobs mostly contributed money and cheerleading to Pixar, but is widely considered a founder of that company.

sheepmullet 12y ago
"There are varying degrees of consequences for lying about these - typically, lying about your salary gets at most a little distrust" Because it is an incredibly gray area. For example I currently get 6 weeks annual leave and very generous medical. If I'm applying at a place that only offers 2 weeks annual leave and limited medical then when they ask my current salary I'm going to add these benefits based on their equivalent cash value. For example I earn ~$2k/wk and so the extra annual leave is worth $8k/year. And to get the equivalent medical would cost me around $10k/year. So I'm going to happily add $18k to my current salary. Likewise I don't feel it is unethical to adjust for cost of living differences between countries and cities. For example if moving to San Francisco for work I would need to be paid about 20% more just to maintain my current income. I don't think talking in purchasing power instead of nominal is unethical. Etc etc etc.

Joeri 12y ago

I don't see how lying about anything could be considered ethical. It may be socially acceptable to lie about yourself, but that doesn't make it ethical. Plenty of things that are socially acceptable are in fact profoundly unethical. So, the line is in fact very simple: if you are an ethical person, you never lie. Update: however, upon reflection, society forces us into practical considerations. If you avoid lying you will be taken advantage of because you weaken your position in society. For that reason, while lying is never ethical, it is sometimes the only realistic alternative. You may for example have people lying about being hiv-positive to get a job. There is no rational reason in many job categories to reject such an applicant, but in practice they won't get a job if they tell the truth. I also would make an exception for withholding the whole truth. Sometimes people have the right not to know things which would only hurt their feelings and bring no practical benefit.