This only benefits the rich, and that's why it will lead you totally astray. It simply leads you to people who've never had to make difficult choices in their life and THAT is why they have never chosen "wrong". Without pressure, making the right choice is not just easy, it destroys your character.
If you think these people will react well in high stakes situations, or under prolonged pressure/stress ... well, go consult for a financial security department of any bank (they need data analysts and programmers, so no problem). Or get some stories from a police officer. There is no shortage of very reputable people who beat up or abandon their family, financially and for real (and while majority male, in reality it's like 60-40 male-female, not that big a difference).
If you think you as an employer will get better treatment ... that's delusional.
It does not speak against someone if they've, say, stolen as a teenager and regret it. If they've gotten into a serious fight and accepted responsibility that should speak to their character. Of course this means that there are circumstances, limits where they will ignore the law. These people simply know what their limits are, and won't snap without warning, lashing out.
Unfortunately these sort of absolutist morals seem to be on the rise. You're merely selecting for people who were born rich, who will behave "perfect", until, suddenly and without warning, without even seeing it coming themselves, do something completely reprehensible, then hide it. A good number of them see themselves as inherently better than people who had and dealt with actual problems in their lives. Of course, the opposite is true: they're much worse.
Absolutist morals like this attitude means one has to behave like those rich "never did anything wrong" people (despite getting arrested for beating up their girlfriend drunk). That behavior is, of course, to lie about it.
Techniques like this will also give a massive advantage to people with psychological problems like narcissism or antisocial disorders. They lie, but they have decades of experience lying about themselves. You cannot seriously hope to see through that without applying pressure. Perhaps the "how they treat serving staff" thing, but only if they're idiots.
Of course management is famous for admitting loads of people with such disorders. Perhaps this is why ...
I forget that every single time I comment on this site I need to include the caveat that if you were born a blind diabetic in Monrovia in the middle of a gunfight in which both your parents died and left you with a debt to the mafia, I don't begrudge you your choices, moral or otherwise.
However, if what you got from either my or the author's take is that we believe rich people are inherently more virtuous by dint of having not been tested, I'm not sure the problem is in either my writing or that in the article.
I think you are looking too much into it. The point about cheating wasn't 'look for someone who never does anything wrong', but more like, if they think they can get away with something that benefits them in way that exposes a lack of integrity (cheating at a game for no stakes and not telling you about it) then you they probably are either:
1. Ego-driven (losses makes them mad) and/or
2. Cannot evaluate risk/reward properly (getting caught cheating significantly
hurts your reputation and you gain nothing from doing it in a friendly game) and/or
3. Are basically dishonest as a rule (untrustworthy)
The way I would handle that situation is not to mark down 'bad person' in my ledger, but to confront them 'hey, I saw you cheating back there, what was that about?' and see how they deal with it.
I don't see these as 'let's all judge everyone', because everyone would fail all of these bullet points. It is more like 'here are some things that can help you evaluate people'. Just like any hokey self-help guide, it is pretty much blatantly obvious stuff that we do anyway without thinking about it, but it can be helpful to be self-aware so that you can alter your own mechanisms.
Have you considered that being dishonest can be a cause of one's poverty? For example, if one develops a reputation for dishonesty, who is going to trust the person for something lucrative? Being dishonest burns down the ladders to success?
One may never even realize this is happening, the doors of opportunity will just remain closed.
I once hired a handyman to do some repairs around the house. I mentioned his name to a neighbor, who said watch out for him, things disappear when he's around. I told the handyman I changed my mind and didn't need him.
I once hired a roofing contractor, who did a good job. But I never got a bill. After some time had passed, I called him up and asked him if he'd sent a bill and I'd lost it or something. He laughed, and said he was going through a divorce and hadn't been able to do the billing. I said I wanted to be sure I didn't stiff him, because then all the local contractors would know that I tried to not pay. He laughed again, and said you bet us contractors pass the word on who avoids payment. We tell them we can't fit them into our schedule.
The prof who taught me accounting used to work as a car salesman. I asked him how to tell a good dealer from a bad one. He said the good ones have been in business for more than 5 years. That means they are living on repeat business. The bad ones get no repeat business, and go bust.
You see how being dishonest burns down ladders to success, and you'll never know it.
I know a professor that routinely steals, and if he gets caught he gets violent. There is a factor of the effect you say, but he's really, really smart. For over 15 years now, he creates new connections faster than he burns through them. Plus, let's not pretend other professors don't burn through connections ... but they cause burnouts in other people. This guy is very smart and can be incredibly helpful, he has much less burned out students than many others. He just also steals and has gotten violent at work. He really understood earlier than his colleagues that making tools for citations works pretty well, he's not getting fired any time soon. Credit to the article: he's no longer married, so I guess that is an indicator.
I know a CEO that has caused traffic accident and did a hit-and-run, was caught, and used company resources for his personal defense, and succeeded at it (he got it down to having his driver's license revoked for a year. So obviously the company "had to" pay for a driver for him). He's still CEO.
I know a senior engineer that crashed his company car ON PURPOSE, because he was refused to have it traded out. Management decided to forgive and forget, and trade out the car.
I know a director of a hospital that has falsified other people's grades (out of jealousy), and gotten caught doing that. She's not getting fired any time soon either. Her dad, by the way, is rich. He got rich through corruption. Like literally, you can google his name and you will find it.
And, I've done business with a senior management figure, someone you know, that got kicked from the company for getting convicted having some of his friends rape his secretary. It was probably not the first time he did that, just the first time he got caught.
So ... no, I don't think dishonesty causes poverty. Frankly, I must say, about most people in higher positions I know I have my suspicions. It's much worse in sales than engineering, but it's not absent.
Also, what is honesty? I'm an expat. Yes I'm honest in the sense that I don't steal for example, or that I take responsibility for an accident in traffic if it's my fault. I'm not like these people above here (that said, I started out dirt poor and, frankly, I have stolen twice. Didn't get caught. I just couldn't deal with not having access to ... I feel incredibly bad because the store I stole something (valued at maybe 150 euro) from went bankrupt 2 years later). That said I lie. First about me & my wife's background (we do not come from the same place, don't share religion, yet we have kids, which is not at all a problem between us, but IS a problem for some people we know). I lie about my kids education (I downplay it A LOT, because you just won't believe the animosity it generates, and, yes, I used money to fix problems they encountered)
If you think these people will react well in high stakes situations, or under prolonged pressure/stress ... well, go consult for a financial security department of any bank (they need data analysts and programmers, so no problem). Or get some stories from a police officer. There is no shortage of very reputable people who beat up or abandon their family, financially and for real (and while majority male, in reality it's like 60-40 male-female, not that big a difference).
If you think you as an employer will get better treatment ... that's delusional.
It does not speak against someone if they've, say, stolen as a teenager and regret it. If they've gotten into a serious fight and accepted responsibility that should speak to their character. Of course this means that there are circumstances, limits where they will ignore the law. These people simply know what their limits are, and won't snap without warning, lashing out.
Unfortunately these sort of absolutist morals seem to be on the rise. You're merely selecting for people who were born rich, who will behave "perfect", until, suddenly and without warning, without even seeing it coming themselves, do something completely reprehensible, then hide it. A good number of them see themselves as inherently better than people who had and dealt with actual problems in their lives. Of course, the opposite is true: they're much worse.
Absolutist morals like this attitude means one has to behave like those rich "never did anything wrong" people (despite getting arrested for beating up their girlfriend drunk). That behavior is, of course, to lie about it.
Techniques like this will also give a massive advantage to people with psychological problems like narcissism or antisocial disorders. They lie, but they have decades of experience lying about themselves. You cannot seriously hope to see through that without applying pressure. Perhaps the "how they treat serving staff" thing, but only if they're idiots.
Of course management is famous for admitting loads of people with such disorders. Perhaps this is why ...