Xmas aftermath
He's better than Mother Teresa. He's still alive, right?
I don't know.
Yep, I saw that piece on 60 Minutes some years back.
I found this on Wikipedia:
Aaron Feuerstein (born 1925) was the third-generation owner[1] and CEO
of Malden Mills in Lawrence, Massachusetts.
When the Malden Mills factory burnt down on December 11, 1995,
Feuerstein decided not only to use his insurance money to rebuild it,
but to also pay the salaries of all the now-unemployed workers while
it was being rebuilt. Feuerstein spent millions keeping all 3,000
employees on the payroll with full benefits for 3 months. By going
against common CEO business practices, especially at a time when most
companies were downsizing and moving overseas, he achieved a small
degree of fame.
Feuerstein claimed that he couldn't have taken other course of action
due to his study of the Talmud and the lessons he learnt the
"I have a responsibility to the worker, both blue-collar and
white-collar. I have an equal responsibility to the community. It
would have been unconscionable to put 3000 people on the streets and
deliver a deathblow to the cities of Lawrence and Methuen. Maybe on
paper our company is worthless to Wall Street, but I can tell you it's
worth more."
—(Parade Magazine, 1996)
While it would cost Aaron Feuerstein $25,000,000 to 'do the right
thing' as well as the turmoil of a November 2001 filing for chapter 11
bankruptcy protection, it appears that applied ethics in business has
positive consequences as Malden Mills continues to garner lucrative
Department of Defense (DOD) contracts for 'smart' products that
interweave fiber optic cabling, electronic biosensors, and USB ports
into polar fleece fabric. Malden Mills was awarded a $16 million
dollar DOD contract in 2006.
vince
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