Ford Pinto

21 Pages 5242 Words

consumer, upon purchasing those products or services, enter themselves into a sales contract with the merchant. As stated by Velasquez; the firm freely and knowingly agrees to give the consumer a product with certain characteristics, and the consumer in turn freely and knowingly agrees to pay a certain sum of money to the firm for the product. In virtue of having voluntarily entered this agreement, the firm then has a duty to provide a product with those characteristics, and the consumer has a correlative right to get a product with those characteristics (2).

As I reflect on this case, the contract view theory, and the inappropriate methods used by Lee Iacocca to get his small compact American made car out into the market first, I can’t help but wonder what happened to contractual view they should have held with the consumer’s to provide them with a product with certain characteristics. Had consumers known about the inherent dangers with the fuel tank design, and the fuel system and the possibilities of fires resulting from rear-end collisions or a potential rollover, there is not doubt that both sales and profits would have been greatly reduced. I’m pretty sure that the faultiness of the fuel system, and the fuel tank was not the characteristics the consumer was made aware of when they purchased the vehicle. I will provide below, my arguments and persuasions as to why I feel this theory best acts in accordance with this case.

Within the contract view theory, Velasquez makes a great statement which defines the expectations of the merchant when dealing in a contractual environment with the consumer. “Hence the contractual theory of business’ duties to consumers claims that a business has four main moral duties: the basic duty of (a) complying with the terms of the sales contract, and the secondary duties of (b) disclosing the nature of the product, (c) avoiding misrepresentation, and (d) avoiding the use of duress and u...