How Volkswagen Cheated the World

        It is mentioned earlier that tight regulations from U.S government was making life difficult for many automakers including Volkswagen. The company was under lots of pressure to comply with certain emission rules, and they were struggling to do so. However, it can be supposed that company like Volkswagen will comply with any regulations as they have been the leading and oldest automakers companies in the world. But surprisingly, it was not the case in 2015, when it was found out that Volkswagen was cheating the emission test to comply with the regulations set by the U.S government. The Volkswagen vehicles engines were emitting nitrogen oxide in the air more than the legal allowed limit in United States, so they were wondering how they can deal with this problem (Rhodes 2016)

        Volkswagen was certainly struggling to make sure that their vehicles comply with the rules set by EPA; otherwise they might have to face serious consequences. It was time for the company to look for right and wrong options, and choosing the right solution to deal with the issues. But it was quite shocking to know that such a huge corporation chosen the wrong path, and came up with a solution, which was to cheat engine emission test. The company could have opted for right choice by making some changes in fundamental designs of their engines so that they can be efficient in consuming fuel along with meeting the required emission standards. But they installed a defeat device in the engines of their vehicles, which were there to cheat emission test. The software was developed in a way that it helped Volkswagen vehicles to pass emission tests from U.S government and once the test is over, the software was programmed to work on normal efficiency, which was to emit nitrogen oxide more than the allowed level (Rhodes 2016)

        The company was sued for cheating device by US Department of Justice, and it was done on behalf of EPA. The scandal revealed that company has sold more than 11 million diesel vehicles with cheating device all around the globe. In United States, the number for vehicles with installed cheating devices was 475,000. The company was doing for the sake of passing the emission test in the lab, whereas the vehicles emissions were more than the legal limit in United States. It was one of the shocking scandals in automobile industry, which was surprising in so many ways that how a company like Volkswagen was so wrong in measuring up the situation. I was quite shocking to realize that such huge corporation can make such big wrong assumption, and install a cheat device deliberately to pass the emission test. The other worst part of the case was that when initially the sandal was revealed, the company totally denied it by saying that it could be any engineering or other kind of fault, and company has not been involved in such wrong practice (The Star’s editorial 2016)

BANSAL, TIMA, MICHAEL KING, and GERARD SEIJTS. 2015. The Volkswagen emissions scandal: A case study in corporate misbehaviour. Accessed December 1, 2018. https://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/rob-commentary/the-vw-emissions-scandala-case-study-in-what-not-to-do/article26550100/.

References of Volkswagen 

Rhodes, Carl. 2016. "Democratic Business Ethics: Volkswagen’s Emissions Scandal and the Disruption of Corporate Sovereignty." Organization Studies 37 (10): 1501-1518.

The Star’s editorial. 2016. VW scandal a case study in bad corporate ethics. Accessed December 1, 2018. https://www.kansascity.com/opinion/editorials/article87287037.html.