Purpose The purpose of this paper is to focus on business responses to the pandemic through an ethical lens and to make recommendations for future research in this unique environment. The Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic presents many ethical implications for businesses’ responses in balancing individual health and firm risks during the initial and recovery stages. What decisions are businesses making in this pandemic environment? What ethical foundations most align with these decisions? Design/methodology/approach The authors review recent business actions taken in response to the pandemic in light of models of motivation for corporate social responsibility (CSR). Findings Businesses have engaged in a wide range of philanthropic CSR actions during the pandemic, likely motivated by both utilitarianism and deontological factors in response to the needs of internal and external stakeholders. The pandemic has disparate impacts, generally hurting lower-income individuals more, likely increasing inequality. Research limitations/implications There are many questions for future research to determine where pandemic-related CSR has different effects for businesses over the long term compared to the pre-pandemic environment. Social implications Businesses must act to benefit society, protect employees and maintain the trust of their stakeholders during the pandemic. Originality/value Existing models have examined corporate disaster philanthropic responses that were localized and acute. Business responses to the COVID-19 virus are unique given the severity, the widespread nature and the duration of the crisis.

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Abstract:Recent calls have been made to move professional standards to a more principles-based perspective, supposing that emphasizing broad principles would eliminate the legalistic focus that rules may encourage, and accountants’ behavior would be more ethical and uniformly so. However, this supposition has yet to be empirically tested. The AICPA Code of Professional Conduct (Code) provides guidance in both forms: principles and rules. This experiment examines how the form of the Code affects independence judgments in a client acceptance context. We also examine the potential for levels of moral development to influence the effectiveness of the Code. We find that subjects are more likely to consider their independence impaired, and are more likely to reject a questionable audit engagement, when rules-based (principles-based) reasoners are provided with Code rules (principles). Given the popularity of the view that rules-based standards are undesirable, these findings have significant implications for the profession as principles-based ethical standards are discussed.

SUMMARY: The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 created the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (hereafter, PCAOB) to oversee audits of public companies. When violations of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act or PCAOB rules are found, the PCAOB may impose sanctions as severe as revoking a firm’s registration or barring a person from participating in audits of public companies. This paper describes the PCAOB enforcement actions issued through 2008. We examine characteristics of the disciplined firms, their PCAOB inspections, the related issuer clients, and the circumstances that resulted in the disciplinary proceedings. Consistent with prior research, we find that firms with issues rising to the level of disciplinary action generally have longer inspections and more audit deficiencies than firms with inspection deficiencies not resulting in sanctions. Disciplined firms also tend to have fewer partners, audit more SEC issuers, and have clients that are smaller and less financially sound.