My upbeat music of the morning – Paul McCartny- Hope for the future

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Look around you. There’s so much opportunity to do good. And unfortunately, there’s way too much opportunity to be bad. And for some of the richest people in the world –there’s the opportunity to do nothing.

In my Rotary Club, we follow guiding principles called the Four-Way Test.

The Four-Way Test:

Of the things we think, do or say:

1 – Is it the truth?
2 – Is it fair to all concerned?
3 – Will it build goodwill and better friendships?
4 – Is it beneficial to all concerned?

Bill Gates (March 9, 2020)

The Gates Foundation and Wellcome are each contributing up to $50 million, and the Mastercard Impact Fund has committed up to $25 million to catalyze the initial work of the accelerator. The Gates Foundation’s funding is part of its up to $100 million commitment to the COVID-19 response announced last month.

Jeff Bezos, the richest person in the world with an income of over $112 billion continues to hoard his wealth at a time when workers need paid health care more than ever.

Instead of Whole Food employees getting paid time off (PTO) to quarantine themselves, they are asked (in an email) to consider donating their own PTO to employees who are sick and need additional time off. I am pretty certain this request is not fair to all concerned, nor will it build goodwill and better friendships.

Might the unspoken expectation be that once they use up all their PTO and their coworkers PTO that they should go in while sick?

Oh, wait a second. I was wrong. Whole Foods also said that it will offer unlimited, unpaid time off during the month of March and 2 weeks of paid time off (PTO) for workers who test positive for Covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.  I’m not really feeling the love, are you?

So, Whole Food workers  will get 2 weeks of PTO if they test positive for the virus and maybe a bit more if they have generous coworkers with available PTO to donate. What if someone in their house has the virus and they need to self-quarantine?

Ok, to be fair, Amazon stocks are only selling at $1,689.15 right now. Jeff Bezos maybe fretful during this crisis but he can put his fears aside (unlike his Whole Foods employees) because Amazon “is opening 100,000 new full and part-time positions across the U.S. in their fulfillment centers and delivery network to meet the surge in demand from people relying on Amazon’s service.”

Of the things we think, do or say:

1 – Is it the truth?
2 – Is it fair to all concerned?
3 – Will it build goodwill and better friendships?
4 – Is it beneficial to all concerned?

I am pretty certain that Jeffery would not pass the Four-Way Test. 

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The next outbreak? We’re not ready – Bill Gates TedTalks April 2015

Bill Gates Blog – How to respond to Coronavirus

Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg where are you?