ACCT 340 Week 2 Reflection Paper Example

Why I Cannot Choose Just One: Reflecting on Duty, Consequences, Virtue and a Christian Ethic in Accounting

A Decision About Late Fees

For two summers I worked in the accounts receivable office of a property management company that manages about 900 apartments. One July, a tenant who had paid on time for six years lost her job and fell two months behind. Our policy charged a $75 late fee each month, and my supervisor asked me to decide whether to waive the fees while she looked for work. It was a small decision, but it made me think about how I decide what is right, and this course's study of the major ethics systems has given me words for what I was doing.

What Each System Gets Right

Mintz and Morris (2019) present the major ethics systems as different ways of reasoning toward a decision. Duty-based ethics, associated with Kant, judges an act by whether it follows a principle that could hold for everyone and treats people as ends rather than means. When I considered the late fees, this view reminded me that the policy should apply consistently, so that I could not waive fees for tenants I liked and charge others in the same situation. A rights-based view added that the tenant had a right to fair and honest treatment under her lease.

Utilitarianism judges an act by its consequences for everyone affected. It pushed me to count more than the $150 in fees: the cost of losing a reliable tenant, the expense of an eviction and the effect on other tenants' trust in the company. Waiving the fees and setting up a payment plan likely produced the best result for both the company and the tenant. Yet I could also see the weakness the textbook points out: utilitarian reasoning can justify almost anything if the numbers are arranged the right way, and it gives no firm protection to a single person who stands in the way of the greater good.

Virtue ethics turns the question toward character: how would an honest, courageous professional act here? Francis (1990) argues that accounting itself is a moral practice, not merely a technical one, because accountants exercise judgment that affects others and can do so well or badly. That idea changed how I saw my small decision. It was not only a matter of applying a policy or adding up outcomes; it was a chance to act with fairness and compassion. Libby and Thorne (2004) found that auditors regard virtues such as integrity, truthfulness, independence and objectivity as essential to their work, alongside practical virtues that help them carry out sound judgments. A theory of character explains why two accountants who know the same rules can act very differently under pressure.

Holding the Systems Together

I found that I could not choose just one system, and I think a Christian worldview explains why. Asked for the greatest commandment, Jesus named love of God with the whole heart, soul and mind, and added a second like it, love of neighbor as of self (English Standard Version Bible, 2001/2016, Matthew 22:37-39). Love of neighbor includes the attention to consequences that utilitarianism values, since loving someone means caring what happens to them. It also includes the respect for persons that duty-based ethics protects, since love never treats a person merely as a means. And it requires the character that virtue ethics describes, because love has to be practiced until it becomes part of who we are.

The difference is in the foundation. Each secular theory rests on human reason, human happiness or human flourishing. A Christian ethic rests on the character of God, who is both just and merciful. That foundation let me see the late-fee decision as more than a trade-off between policy and compassion. I recommended a consistent hardship rule that any tenant in similar circumstances could use, which honored fairness, and a payment plan for this tenant, which honored mercy. My supervisor approved both, and the tenant paid the balance in full by October after finding new work. I do not think the good result proves the decision was right; a Christian ethic would have asked the same of me even if she had moved out owing money. But the episode showed me that fairness and mercy are not rivals when a decision is designed carefully, and that an accountant's small choices about policy can carry real moral weight for the people on the other side of the ledger.

What I Will Carry Into Practice

I am encouraged that ethical reasoning can grow. Dellaportas (2006) found that students who completed a stand-alone accounting ethics course showed higher levels of moral reasoning afterward, which suggests that studying these systems carefully, as this course asks, can change how accountants think. Knowing the theories will not make me ethical, but practicing them on small decisions may prepare me for the large ones. I intend to carry three commitments into my career: to apply rules consistently rather than by preference, to count the effects of my decisions on everyone they touch and to build the habits of honesty and courage that I will need when a decision is not as small as a $75 late fee.

References

Dellaportas, S. (2006). Making a difference with a discrete course on accounting ethics. Journal of Business Ethics, 65(4), 391-404. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-006-0020-7

English Standard Version Bible. (2016). Crossway. (Original work published 2001)

Francis, J. R. (1990). After virtue? Accounting as a moral and discursive practice. Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, 3(3), 5-17. https://doi.org/10.1108/09513579010142436

Libby, T., & Thorne, L. (2004). The identification and categorization of auditors' virtues. Business Ethics Quarterly, 14(3), 479-498. https://doi.org/10.5840/beq200414331

Mintz, S. M., & Morris, R. E. (2019). Ethical obligations and decision making in accounting: Text and cases (5th ed.). McGraw-Hill Education.