Penn Andersen
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As with Arthur Andersen, the NCAA punishes the many for the sins of the few
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Today, the NCAA imposed sanctions on Penn State University for its scandal regarding child abuse by one of its coaches. Such included fines of $60 million, an order for Penn State to sit out the postseason for four years, capped scholarships below the normal limit for four years and the football program on five years’ probation.
At first blush, most people would think this as justice done and get a feeling of satisfaction. But the reality is that perhaps tens of thousands of innocent people, from stadium vendors to college students, are being punished for the wrongs of a small handful of people. Specifically, former and now deceased head coach Joe Paterno, then university president Graham Spanier, athletic director Tim Curley and now-retired vice-president Gary Schultz, covered up the sexual abuse of children by assistant coach Jerry Sandusky. They have all left Penn State, one way or another, and face the prospect of criminal charges, except for Mr. Paterno who is facing the ultimate judge in the Great Beyond.
Above: In the Clint Eastwood movie “Hang ‘em High,” hanging innocent people was recognized as a mistake. Why doesn’t the NCAA recognize such error?
Yet somehow the NCAA, perhaps in a rare fit of introspection that has not existed to date, decided to come down hard on the institution as a whole. For anyone who thinks this will achieve the goal of deterrence, they are sorely mistaken. Few leaders of any institution will tailor their actions in the future based upon what will happen to the organization they are working for. They might, however, make their actions comport to a level of acceptability if they had their own interests at stake.
Which takes us to the NCAA’s Arthur Andersen treatment of Penn State. With Andersen, the Department of Justice filed charges against the former public accounting firm because a relatively small group of people committed crimes. The DOJ’s actions ended the existence of the firm and put tens of thousands of honest, hard-working people out of work, as well as reduced the pool of large accounting firms that large audit clients could go to, thus ultimately hurting the consumer.
Perhaps such treatment is congruent with the prevailing mindset of sharing the pain. After all, the government uses the taxpayer to underwrite many of the industries that belly-flop, resulting in what has been the privatization of profit and the socialization of risk. ObamaCare is also such spreading of the pain to unrelated parties that underwrite the costs of others, whether they want to or not.
But in the end, punishing innocent bystanders can only dilute what the perpetrators of wrong deserve, which does not serve as the deterrent that is trying to be achieved.
-I.M. Windee
