171: Counterfeiting’s Effects

Counterfeiting: the activity of making illegal copies of things such as bank notes, DVDs, or official documents, or products that are of lesser value than the genuine ones.

WHAT IS A COUNTERFEIT PRODUCT?

To counterfeit means to illegally imitate an item or good. Counterfeit products are often produced with the intent to take advantage of the superior value of the imitated product. Counterfeit products may look like the brand name product, but are made with inferior materials and are low quality. Counterfeit products are illegal to buy and sell because they infringe trademarks and copyrights and deceive consumers.

According to Dan Ariely, author of THE (HONEST) TRUTH ABOUT DISHONESTY, experiments he conducted provides evidence that wearing counterfeits colors the way we view ourselves and that once we are painted as cheaters in our own eyes, we start behaving in more dishonest ways  (page 131).

IT SEEMS, THEN, that the clothes do make the man (or woman) and that wearing knockoffs does have an effect on ethical decisions.  …understanding how slippery slopes operate can direct us to pay more attention to early cases of transgression and help us apply the brakes before it’s too late. (page 131.

…we all pay a price for counterfeits in terms of moral currency; “faking it” changes our behavior, our self-image, and the way we view others around us.  page 135

In the end, we concluded that counterfeit products not only tend to make us more dishonest; they cause us to view others as less than honest as well. (page 134)

The impact of counterfeiting Industry world-wide loses large amounts to counterfeiters. These losses not only affect the producers of genuine items, but they also involve social costs. The ultimate victims of unfair competition are the consumers.

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