The Ethics of Accepting Freebies

Reader Comments
Back to blog

I don't see why freebies themselves are unethical. They can, however, be accompanied by other unethical behavior - like stealing, lying, or making threats - on the part of the giver or the recipient.
For example: Accepting your date's offer to pay for dinner? Ethical. Deliberately leading him to believe that you want to sleep with him when you don't? Unethical.
I admit I'd be annoyed by a woman who bragged about how much free stuff she got from men who "just can't help themselves." And I'm sure that such women exist. But let's not forget that Gary's pretty girlfriend is a fictional character.

Johanna of MD 3:46PM January 27, 2009

Wayward- Fascinating situation. Definitely ethically dubious. I agree with you - that's just stealing.

Kimberly Palmer of 3:38PM January 27, 2009

It really depends on who is doing the giving. If the manager, owner, or lead person on shift, is doing the giving I don't feel oddly about accepting, with gracious thanks of course.
But if a staff member is deciding to do some giving, it often gives me pause.
In college, a good friend of mine worked as a barista on campus. She would give all her friends and acquaintances one free drink per day with the expectation that the recipient would place half the normal purchase price of the drink in her tip jar. The recipient gets a half-price drink; the barista gets more take-home pay. But this arrangement, although beneficial to the direct participants, really amounted to stealing from the proprietor.
I ended up going to a different coffee shop because it was very uncomfortable to go to her and try to explain that I wanted to pay for my drink and give my money to "the man," which amounted to taking money out of her pocket.

Wayward of CA 3:29PM January 27, 2009