The same thing happened in many companies. Senior executives were awarded stock options at exactly the optimal time for them. It was clear that this compensation was artificially and illegally manipulated for the benefit of the senior executives.
This was a big scandal at the beginning of the 21st century. At least 46 executives and directors were ousted from their positions, including at least nine CEOs, seven finance chiefs and seven general counsels. Companies had to lower their earnings by more than $5 billion as a result of the exposure of this illegal manipulation.
In 2018, JP Morgan bought back 181.5 million shares of stock for $20 billion. Also in 2018, JP Morgan issued 32 million new shares to management (18% of buyback). Those newly issued shares were worth $3.5 billion then, and are worth $4.2 billion today. In 2017, JP Morgan bought back 166.6 million shares of stock for $15.4 billion. Also in 2017, JP Morgan issued 31 million new shares to management (18% of buyback). Those newly issued shares were worth $2.9 billion then, and are worth $4.03 billion today. In 2016, JP Morgan bought back 140.4 million shares of stock for $9.1 billion. Also in 2016, JP Morgan issued 38 million new shares to management (27% of buyback). Those newly issued shares were worth $2.5 billion then, and are worth $4.94 billion today.
Senior management received more than 97% of the newly issued shares.
This is an ongoing issue. It includes many scandals such as insider trading at the highest levels, huge auto manufacturers making vehicles specially designed to give false results in government testing, drug companies suddenly raising the prices of vital medicines with no competitors by hundreds of percents even though they had been profitably produced and sold at their low prices for decades, Congressional mandates not allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices, accounting fraud on a grand scale (e.g. expensing investments is clearly chomos), collusion by the big banks in setting the LIBOR rate.
We would also add the entire US government spending process in recent years, including passing spending bills and tax cuts with expiration dates to minimize their apparent impact, running huge deficits in a time of growth and when the population is aging, spending US Social Security assets and generally making lavish promises without setting up a way to pay for them.
Arguably the tolerance and even enthusiasm of investors for companies that have a business model based on growth and not profit is an instance of chomos, especially when no path to earnings is proffered in companies such as Uber, Lyft, WeWork, Netflix and even maybe the mighty Amazon.
Healthcare is another area that is a candidate for widespread chomos. The US is by far the biggest spender on healthcare in the world at around 18% of its GDP compared to an OECD average of less than 9%. Yet the outcomes in the US are way below average. The US is number 26 in life expectancy among the OECD countries. Of all the top 10 spenders on healthcare, only three are in the top 10 of the results. This is prima facie evidence of chomos, but perhaps not conclusive. Reports of a systematic lack of price transparency and tremendous variation in the charges for the same service are strong indications of the presence of chomos.
The pattern should be clear by now. Widespread abuse that stems from a general desire to take whatever one can, rightfully or not.
HaRav Hirsch explains that society cannot protect itself against these abuses. They are the results of private actions that take place where they are not observed by anyone besides the actors themselves. The final effects are visible, but they are generally far removed from the wrong actions.
The only way they will not happen is if everyone practices self-restraint. Only if the sense of morality of all the members of society prevents them from acting in morally questionable ways because of their internal principles of behavior, can this type of crime be realistically avoided.
HaRav Hirsch has a very succinct characterization of the process as described by the Torah:
"First there was moral decay. There were sins and crimes that secular, civil society does not concern itself with. If the youth is licentious and family life is rotten, the economy can still flourish and business can be conducted honestly - or so think the people. However, once the land is corrupt before Hashem, no amount of legislation and regulation can save it from doom.
"The land will not fill up with open theft; with its powers of punishment and imprisonment, society can protect itself against thieves. Society will be lost to chomos, to crimes that are abetted by sophistication. There is no defense against chomos if a person's personal conscience does not bring him to task before Hashem. Moral corruption destroys the conscience, and with the passing of conscience, social peace and stability are also destroyed."
The first part of the pasuk that we quoted at the outset explains the last part. Vatishocheis ho'oretz lifnei ho'Elokim - and the Land became corrupt before G-d. This says that there is a breakdown in sexual morality. The basic parameters of such a society are as defined in the Torah and recognized universally in the Western world until quite recently. They require restraint and public conduct that follows the rules of the Bible and the natural order. Sexuality is private and follows the rules that were generally accepted for thousands of years.
If this breaks down, then the result according to the Torah is the consequent of the pasuk: vatimolei ho'oretz chomos - and the Land became full of monetary corruption.
When the land becomes corrupt before Hashem, meaning that there is widespread breakdown of sexual morals, it will destroy people's internal moral compass. Lack of restraint in sexual matters will eliminate the power of restraint all over, including in monetary matters.
This is the lesson of the Torah, and we can see the evidence for it all around us in the modern world.
This is not the place to argue for the correctness of the Torah's morals, but rather to show what we should expect to happen from a Torah viewpoint.
Individual instances of chomos that are cited here were noted by many, but generally relatively isolated phenomena, and not in the context of a more generalized breakdown of moral restraint as is argued here. It is the perspective of the Torah that allows us to see it all as a single expression of a single breakdown, and furthermore to connect it with the collapse of sexual morals.
