Deception and Withholding Information in Sales
本文批评了现有关于销售人员道德义务的观点，提出了更合理的理论，认为销售人员有初步义务警告潜在危害、不撒谎欺骗、诚实回答问题、不引导顾客购买可能有害的商品。
The ethics of sales is an important, but neglected, topic in business ethics. I offer criticisms of what others have said about the moral duties of salespeople and formulate what I take to be a more plausible theory. My theory avoids the objections I raise against others and yields plausible results when applied to cases. I also defend my theory by appeal to the golden rule and offer a justification for the version of the golden rule to which I appeal. I argue that salespeople have prima facie duties to do the following: 1. warn customers of potential hazards, 2. refrain from lying and deception, 3. fully and honestly answer questions about what they are selling, and 4. refrain from steering customers toward purchases they have reason to think will harm the customers. The paper concludes with a brief appendix that discusses the implications of the ethics of sales for the social responsibilities of business.