Utilitarianism and the Ford Pinto Case The Ford Motor Company manufactured a subcompact vehicle called the Ford Pinto during the years from 1970 to 1980. The Ford Pinto was advertised successfully to consumers and The Ford Motor Company was rewarded with sales for the Ford Pinto in the hundreds of thousands. Was the reward worth the cost? The Ford Motor Company knowingly engineered the Ford Pinto with a design flaw in the placement of the gas tank and a design flaw in the connection of the fuel
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Japanese imports from Toyota and Datsun in May of 1968‚ the Ford Motor Company‚ based upon a recommendation by then vice-president Lee Iacocca‚ decided to introduce a subcompact car and produce it domestically. (Leggett‚ 1999) The Ford Pinto appeared on the market in 1970‚ and sales of the car were good for the first few years. The engineers designed the gas tank to be positioned between the bumper and the rear axle. This design
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Moral Intensity of Ford Pinto Case Magnitude of the Consequences From the perspective of senior managers who made the decision‚ the magnitude of consequences introducing the Ford Pinto to the market is small. To support this point of view‚ Ford vice President firstly cited several statistical evidences. In 1975‚ only 12 of 848 deaths‚ which associated with passenger-car accidents in which fires also occurred‚ involved occupants of Pintos. And in 1976‚ the number of occupant fatalities in fire-associated
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V. Sources INTRODUCTION “For seven years the Ford Motor Company sold cars in which it knew hundreds of people would needlessly burn to death.” Mark Dowie‚ Author of Pinto Madness (8) One of the biggest automotive news stories in the latter part of the 1970’s dealt with tales of exploding Ford Pintos and the considerable awards civil court juries were presenting to victims of accidents involving the cars. Ford produced the Pinto automobile from 1971 to 1980. Initially the car sold
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Ford Pinto Case Ford Pinto Case If we were involved in the Ford Pinto dilemma we would have used Deontological Ethical reasoning to decide whether or not to disclose the danger that the Pinto posed and/or use that reasoning to determine whether or not to install the part(s) that would make the Ford Pinto safer. Our decision would be to do what is morally right and avoid doing what is morally wrong‚ regardless of the consequences. True enough Ford was not obligated by government regulation or
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Case Study: Ford Pinto MGT/216 07/17/20 Case Study: Ford Pinto Abstract In 1971‚ Ford Motor Company (FMC)‚ on the advice of then vice-president Lee Iacocca‚ introduced the first subcompact vehicle‚ the Ford Pinto. After production had begun and the release of the Pinto in the United States‚ Ford discovered a defect in the design on the fuel system; the gas tank was placed in the rear of the vehicle. This error could cause the vehicle to explode on low speed rear end collisions due to a
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Ford Pinto Case Brief There was strong competition for Ford in the American small-car market from Volkswagen and several Japanese companies in the 1960’s. To fight the competition‚ Ford rushed its newest car the Pinto into production in much less time than it usually required to develop a car. The regular time to produce an automobile is 43 months; Ford took 25 months. Before production however‚ Ford engineers discovered a major flaw in the cars design. In nearly all rear-end crash test collisions
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Case Study of the Ford Pinto Fires The existing prestigious Ford Motor Company has been in business centuries. Ford is known as a worldwide leader in automotive technology‚ automotive-related products and motor vehicle services. Over the last 20 years the company has been venturing into newer industries such as aerospace‚ communications‚ and financial services. Discussing in detail the Ford Pinto fires Team D agrees that the Ford Motor Company’s main focus in the 70’s was to gain profit and
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Ford Pinto Ethics Case Analysis Dickey L. Sours Jr. Business Ethics Course The Ford Pinto designs had the placement of the fuel tank behind the rear axle. The fuel tank position has allowed the projecting bolts to puncture the tank when the vehicle was struck from the rear. The Ford Motor Company had decided not to change the fuel tanks design location in order to reduce the production costs. Ford Motor Company determined there would be a savings of approximately $20.9 million dollars. Between
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decision-making framework. The Pinto safety issue was evaluated utilizing a Utilitarian framework motivated by the CEO’s Egoism. From a risk management standpoint‚ this may be the most dangerous combination in a decision-making. The Procedural steps of the decision making framework was Utilitarian in nature‚ Ford chose the action that would cause the least amount of harm for the majority involved‚ therefore allowing the minority to be harmed by death. Apparently‚ Ford did not care about the type
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