Ethical Collecting at Your Job

My dad was a beat policeman in Jersey City in the 1950's and he assembled a pretty nice coin collection by asking shop owners if he could look through their change. He was honest and polite (and pretty charming) but if they said no he would respect their wishes.

He actually found a 1916-D dime once, imagine that.

He used the collection to move us out of a Jersey City apartment and into a nice little house on Long Island. And I believe he made it a point to reward the shop owners who let him search their tills every Christmas with a little gift.

He was a classy guy.

 

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No! In a word, hellno!! I always wonder what makes ppl open their mouths in times like this, they're not doing anything dishonest so why tell someone when it's nobody's business? The consequences could be disastrous!! Keep the mouth shut if you want to stay at least half way friendly with your boss!! The boss may want some of that $10,000, that's the obvious reason to keep mouth shut!!

 

If you found a bill worth a hundred bucks and told your boss, he probably wouldn't care. If you found one worth a thousand bucks, he might want to split it with you. If it was worth 10,000 dollars, he might give you a thousand bucks and keep the rest.

Like I said before, if you worked for a mom and pop outfit, I could see telling the boss, but if you work in a mall for a retail chain store, take the money and run. Why should the manager profit from your windfall? He wouldn't share it with you if he found it, and he's certainly not going to give it to the owners of the store you both work for.

 

I like this example.

 

Legally, I think taking anything of value from your employer is a form of theft or fraud, even if he doesn't know the value.

I'm a stamp collector, too, and I'm thinking of the CIA invert, a valuable error stamp, the only examples of which come from a pane of stamps once owned by the CIA. A stamp-collecting employee there noticed the pane after about a dozen stamps from it had already been used, and recognized its potential value. He contrived with his boss and some other employees to replace the stamps with ordinary ones of the same type, keep some and sell the rest.

In stamp collecting, the provenance of an error stamp is critical to its value; unless it can be shown to have entered circulation normally, it will probably be defined as "printer's waste", and have little value. In the course of verifying the stamps, their source became known to stamp dealers, the press and ultimately the CIA.

The CIA demanded the proceeds from the stamp sales and the stamps each employee had kept for himself. They got the money, and the employees who refused to turn in their stamps were fired, this being confirmed as valid by civil service and court hearings.

 

I guess I would agree with this point of view unless the boss were a close aquaintence or a friend.

 

Is this little old lady filthy rich or on a fixed income? :smile

 

This story just goes to show that the bumper sticker is true, " Don't steal, the government doesn't like competition!"

I do not feel that this story validates any sort of moral answer, it just goes to show what happens when you leak the secret and someone very powerful and greedy demands what you fairly found through knowledge

 

I would agree!

As, I stated in my opinion, circumstance plays a roll, when I ask my friends for a coin of value, I make it a point to give them the best estimate of it's true value along with an offer I would feel fair in making for it. I would also treat that same courtesy to anyone that didn't share a background with me in numismatic study. Dealers should fend for themselves and vie for the best deal, the same as myself as the buyer.

P.S. I was ROTFL at your Filthy rich old lady response!!!:thumb:

 

True...but that cost is sometimes a small fraction of the amount that can be made or was made. But I'm happy if the teller's are and the order me halves.

 

Yeah, I agree, at the end of the day you still gotta feel good about what consequences your actions have.

By the way if she was filthy rich I just might take the gamble on that trip to hades.

 

I hate to say it but if she didn't realize that they were worth more than face, as I stated earlier, even in this scenario I would have to inform her of the true value of each... but I would hope that being filthy rich she would reward me with a gift of one ( being Italian, I grew up under the impression that it is a great insult to refuse a gift ) hence my karma would be fine with excepting it as such