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《Trust and Individual Fair Dealing》歌词


歌曲: Trust and Individual Fair Dealing

所属专辑:美国名校励志演说 17篇

歌手: 英语演讲

时长: 15:28

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Trust and Individual Fair Dealing

Trust and Individual Fair Dealing - 英语演讲[00:00:02]

Address by Alan Greenspan [00:00:08]

at University of Pennsylvania[00:00:10]

Dean Harker, members of the faculty,[00:00:13]

Wharton alumni, friends and families and,[00:00:17]

especially, members of the 2005 graduating class.[00:00:21]

I have more in common with you graduates[00:00:25]

than people might think. [00:00:29]

After all, before long, after my term[00:00:30]

at the Federal Reserve comes to an end, [00:00:33]

I too will be looking for a job.[00:00:35]

I am delighted to join in celebrating [00:00:38]

your achievements and promise.[00:00:43]

You are being bequeathed the tools [00:00:45]

for creating a material existence [00:00:48]

that neither my generation nor any [00:00:50]

that preceded it could have even [00:00:53]

remotely imagined as we began our life's work. [00:00:56]

What you must fashion for yourselves[00:01:00]

are those values that will enable you [00:01:03]

to contribute and thrive in a world [00:01:06]

that is becoming increasingly competitive and frenetic.[00:01:08]

The creative abilities of this graduating class [00:01:12]

and those of your contemporaries will determine [00:01:19]

the magnitude and extent of American prosperity[00:01:22]

in this century. And the ideas and values [00:01:25]

that you employ in these creative endeavors [00:01:29]

will shape the future state of our cultural,[00:01:32]

legal, and economic institutions.[00:01:35]

You will doubtless foster advances in science, [00:01:38]

engineering, and business management. [00:01:42]

But scientific proficiency will not be enough.[00:01:48]

Technology is a tool that, unless guided[00:01:50]

by a set of ethical principles, is of qualified value.[00:01:53]

The principles governing business behavior[00:01:58]

are an essential support to voluntary exchange, [00:02:03]

the defining characteristic of free markets. [00:02:06]

Voluntary exchange, in turn, [00:02:09]

implies trust in the word of those with[00:02:13]

whom we do business. To be sure,[00:02:16]

all market economies require a rule of law to function -[00:02:18]

laws of contracts, rights to property,[00:02:23]

and a general protection of citizens[00:02:26]

from arbitrary actions of the state. [00:02:30]

Yet, if even a small fraction of legally [00:02:31]

binding transactions required adjudication, [00:02:35]

our court systems would be swamped into immobility, [00:02:38]

and a rule of law would be unenforceable.[00:02:43]

Of necessity, therefore, in virtually [00:02:47]

all our transactions, whether with customers or with colleagues,[00:02:52]

with friends or with strangers,[00:02:56]

we rely on the word of those [00:02:58]

with whom we do business.[00:03:01]

If we could not do so, goods [00:03:02]

and services could not be exchanged efficiently.[00:03:05]

Trillions of dollars of assets are priced[00:03:08]

and traded daily in our financial markets.[00:03:13]

Before recent technologies enabled transactions[00:03:17]

to clear and settle virtually in real time,[00:03:20]

most of the vast volumes of trades[00:03:23]

were not legally binding for days. [00:03:26]

Their validity rested on trust.[00:03:29]

Even today, much of business is transacted [00:03:33]

on parties' undocumented verbal agreements.[00:03:36]

We take this for granted and rarely pause [00:03:39]

to ponder how unusual this practice is.[00:03:44]

Moreover, even when followed to the letter,[00:03:47]

laws guide only a few of the day-to-day[00:03:52]

decisions required of business and financial managers.[00:03:56]

The rest are governed by whatever personal code [00:03:59]

of values market participants bring to the table.[00:04:03]

Trust as the necessary condition for commerce[00:04:07]

was particularly evident in freewheeling nineteenth century America,[00:04:12]

where reputation became a valued asset.[00:04:17]

Throughout much of that century, [00:04:21]

laissez-faire reigned in the United States as elsewhere,[00:04:23]

and caveat emptor was the prevailing prescription[00:04:28]

for guarding against wide-open trading practices. [00:04:32]

In such an environment, a reputation for honest dealing,[00:04:36]

which many feared was in short supply,[00:04:41]

was particularly valued. [00:04:43]

Even those inclined to be less than scrupulous [00:04:46]

in their personal dealings had to adhere to[00:04:49]

a more ethical standard in their market transactions,[00:04:53]

or they risked being driven out of business.[00:04:57]

To be sure, the history of world business,[00:05:00]

then and now, is strewn with Fisks, Goulds, [00:05:05]

Ponzis and numerous others treading on,[00:05:09]

or over, the edge of legality. [00:05:13]

But, despite their prominence, [00:05:15]

they were a distinct minority.[00:05:18]

If the situation had been otherwise,[00:05:20]

late nineteenth and early twentieth century America [00:05:23]

would never have realized so high a standard of living.[00:05:26]

Indeed, we could not have achieved our current level[00:05:30]

of national productivity if ethical behavior[00:05:34]

had not been the norm or [00:05:37]

if corporate governance had been deeply flawed.[00:05:40]

Over the past half-century, [00:05:43]

societies have chosen to embrace the protections[00:05:47]

of myriad government financial regulations [00:05:51]

and implied certifications of integrity [00:05:54]

as a supplement to, if not a substitute for,[00:05:57]

business reputation.[00:06:01]

Most observers believe that the world [00:06:03]

is better off as a consequence of these governmental protections.[00:06:07]

Accordingly, the market value of trust, [00:06:11]

so prominent in the 1800s,[00:06:14]

seemed by the 1990s to have become less necessary.[00:06:17]

But recent corporate scandals in the United States [00:06:22]

and elsewhere have clearly shown [00:06:28]

that the plethora of laws and regulations [00:06:30]

of the past century have not eliminated [00:06:33]

the less-savory side of human behavior. [00:06:37]

We should not be surprised then to see[00:06:39]

a re-emergence of the value placed by markets [00:06:43]

on trust and personal reputation in business practice. [00:06:46]

After the revelations of recent corporate malfeasance,[00:06:50]

the market punished the stock [00:06:55]

and bond prices of those corporations [00:06:58]

whose behaviors had cast doubt on the reliability[00:07:00]

of their reputations. [00:07:04]

There may be no better antidote for business [00:07:06]

and financial transgression.[00:07:09]

But in the wake of the scandals, [00:07:11]

the Congress clearly signaled that more was needed.[00:07:13]

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 appropriately places [00:07:18]

the explicit responsibility for certification[00:07:25]

of the soundness of accounting and disclosure procedures [00:07:28]

on the chief executive officer, [00:07:32]

who holds most of the decision making power [00:07:35]

in the modern corporation. [00:07:38]

Merely certifying that generally [00:07:40]

accepted accounting principles [00:07:43]

were being followed is no longer enough. [00:07:44]

Even full adherence to those principles,[00:07:47]

given some of the imaginative accounting of recent years, [00:07:51]

has proved inadequate.[00:07:55]

I am surprised that the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, [00:07:57]

so rapidly developed and enacted,[00:08:01]

has functioned as well as it has.[00:08:04]

It will doubtless be fine-tuned [00:08:06]

as experience with the act's details points the way.[00:08:10]

But the act importantly reinforced the principle [00:08:14]

that shareholders own our corporations [00:08:19]

and that corporate managers should be[00:08:22]

working on behalf of shareholders to[00:08:25]

allocate business resources to their optimum use.[00:08:27]

But as our economy has grown,[00:08:32]

and our business units have become ever larger, [00:08:35]

de facto shareholder control has diminished.[00:08:38]

Ownership has become more dispersed[00:08:42]

and few shareholders have sufficient stakes [00:08:45]

to individually influence the choice of boards [00:08:48]

of directors or chief executive officers.[00:08:51]

The vast majority of corporate share ownership is,[00:08:55]

of course, for investment, [00:08:59]

not to achieve operating control of a company.[00:09:01]

Thus, it has increasingly fallen to corporate officers, [00:09:04]

especially the chief executive officer, [00:09:10]

to guide the business, one hopes by [00:09:13]

what is perceived to be in the best interest of shareholders. [00:09:17]

To be sure, senior officers in today's corporations [00:09:20]

no longer have the dominance [00:09:25]

that they were able to achieve prior to [00:09:27]

the revolution in information technology.[00:09:29]

A decade ago, senior officers of a corporation [00:09:32]

could tightly control, if they chose,[00:09:36]

access to key information systems. [00:09:39]

Those senior officers could have far[00:09:42]

greater knowledge of the workings of their business [00:09:45]

than others and, as a consequence, [00:09:47]

were less subject to challenge [00:09:50]

when making day-by-day tactical and strategic decisions.[00:09:53]

Arguably, with information systems now accessible [00:09:57]

to broader ranges of managers and other employees,[00:10:03]

the monopoly power that proprietary information[00:10:07]

affords has been significantly reduced.[00:10:11]

Moreover, the availability of vital information[00:10:14]

now often extends beyond the borders of the company [00:10:18]

to suppliers and customers as well.[00:10:22]

A generation ago, for example,[00:10:24]

a purchasing manager rarely divulged to[00:10:27]

a supplier the state of the company's inventory position.[00:10:31]

It was presumed that such information [00:10:34]

in the hands of suppliers would undermine[00:10:38]

the bargaining position of the purchasing manager.[00:10:40]

Today such information is broadly [00:10:43]

and routinely shared to facilitate[00:10:47]

just-in-time supply systems. [00:10:49]

In general, technologies may be in the process[00:10:52]

of facilitating a much broader access to information,[00:10:56]

with the consequence that CEOs [00:11:00]

could increasingly face more careful monitoring.[00:11:03]

It seems clear that, if the CEO chooses,[00:11:06]

he or she can, by example and through oversight, [00:11:12]

induce corporate colleagues and outside auditors [00:11:16]

to behave ethically. Companies run by people[00:11:19]

with high ethical standards arguably do not[00:11:24]

need detailed rules on how to act in the long-run [00:11:28]

interest of shareholders and, presumably, themselves.[00:11:32]

But, regrettably, human beings come as we are -[00:11:36]

some with enviable standards, [00:11:40]

and others who continually seek to cut corners.[00:11:43]

Rules exist to govern behavior, [00:11:46]

but rules cannot substitute for character.[00:11:51]

In the years going forward, [00:11:54]

it will be your reputation - [00:11:57]

for integrity, judgment, [00:11:59]

and other qualities of character -[00:12:02]

that will determine your success in life [00:12:03]

and in business. A generation from now, [00:12:06]

as you watch your children graduate, [00:12:10]

you will want to be able to say [00:12:13]

that whatever success you achieved [00:12:16]

was the result of honest and productive work,[00:12:18]

and that you dealt with people [00:12:21]

the way you would want them to deal with you.[00:12:23]

I presume that I could offer all kinds of [00:12:26]

advice to today's graduates from my nearly [00:12:32]

six decades in private business and government. [00:12:35]

I could urge you all to work hard, save, and prosper.[00:12:39]

And I do. But transcending all else [00:12:44]

is being principled in how you go [00:12:48]

about doing those things.[00:12:51]

It is decidedly not true that "nice guys finish last,"[00:12:53]

as that highly original American baseball philosopher Leo Durocher [00:12:58]

was once alleged to have said.[00:13:03]

I do not deny that many appear to[00:13:06]

have succeeded in a material way[00:13:10]

by cutting corners and manipulating associates,[00:13:12]

both in their professional and in their personal lives.[00:13:16]

But material success is possible in this world, [00:13:19]

and far more satisfying, when it comes[00:13:23]

without exploiting others. [00:13:26]

The true measure of a career is to be able to be content,[00:13:29]

even proud, that you succeeded [00:13:33]

through your own endeavors without leaving a trail[00:13:36]

of casualties in your wake.[00:13:40]

Our system works fundamentally on trust [00:13:42]

and individual fair dealing.[00:13:47]

We need only look around today's world[00:13:50]

to realize how valuable these traits are [00:13:53]

and the consequences of their absence.[00:13:57]

While we have achieved much [00:13:59]

as a nation in this regard, more remains to be done.[00:14:02]

Prejudice of whatever stripe is unworthy[00:14:06]

of a society built on individual merit. [00:14:11]

A free market capitalist system cannot operate[00:14:14]

fully effectively unless all participants in the economy[00:14:19]

are given opportunities to achieve their best.[00:14:23]

If we succeed in opening up opportunities to everyone,[00:14:26]

our national affluence will almost surely [00:14:31]

become more widespread. Of even greater import is[00:14:35]

that all Americans recognize that they [00:14:39]

are part of a system that is fair and worthy of support.[00:14:43]

Our forefathers bestowed upon us a system of [00:14:46]

government and a culture of enterprise [00:14:52]

that have propelled the United States[00:14:54]

to the greatest material prosperity the world[00:14:57]

has ever experienced. [00:15:00]

Today's Wharton graduates are being passed[00:15:01]

the standard to carry forward those traditions.[00:15:06]

I know you will improve upon this inheritance [00:15:09]

in ways that we have yet to imagine.[00:15:13]

I offer you all my congratulations [00:15:15]

and wish you success in your chosen careers.[00:15:20]