Jeffrey L. Seglin's Blog, page 55

Taking advantage of drought rebate system is ethically barren

Last summer, California Gov. Jerry Brown urged residents of the state to conserve water during what's turned out to be a severe drought. His goal was to curtail water usage by 20 percent, but the reported results of the voluntary cutback amounted to only a 9 percent savings. As a result, the state starting offering sizable monetary incentives for homeowners to replace water-thirsty lawns. Some payments were as high as $6,000, at $2 per square foot of lawn replaced.
Homeowners seized the opportunity and soon the initial funds set aside were depleted. More money was added to the kitty and more residents applied for rebates. A reader in northern California writes that one of her neighbors is going to extremes to take advantage of the program.
"I live in drought-plagued northern California," D.M. writes. "Since the situation is so severe, some communities give stipends if homeowners uproot lawn areas and plant them with something less water-dependent."
A neighbor has told her he intends to spend $200 to plant a lawn. He'll then apply for a rebate of $1,200 to rip out the new grass -- yielding a profit of $1,000 for removing a lawn he never intended to have in the first place.
D.M. finds his actions both "cockamamie" and unethical. "If nothing else, it's bad karma," she writes.
I'm not sure how karma works in northern California, so I can't speak to that, but D.M. makes a good point. Even if her neighbor is not doing anything illegal based on how the rebate system works, he's certainly violating the spirit of the plan: to replace existing lawns with ground cover that needs less water.
It's often a challenge to make sure those who take advantage of such government programs are truly deserving. In the late 1990s, after the Red River flooded parts of North Dakota, residents were invited to relocate after utilities had been shut down so public works employees could dig in and get everyone back online. Relief agencies and other non-profits set up food banks and clothing drives to help the displaced.
However, as long as residents lined up for relief could prove they lived in the towns affected, not all were asked for proof that their specific home had no utilities. Those who accepted relief services they didn't deserve meant there was less for those actually in need.
Is D.M.'s neighbor acting illegally? Probably not. Are his actions unethical? Certainly. The right thing to do would be for her neighbor to simply live with his landscaping as is, rather than spending a small amount of money to get a bigger rebate.
If California municipalities want to ensure that such misguided efforts don't become commonplace, and to make sure their resources can actually achieve the intended goal of conserving water, the right thing to do is create a mechanism whereby homeowners must prove they haven't worked the system by planting a lawn with the sole intention of fleecing the state. 
Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of  The Right Thing: Conscience, Profit and Personal Responsibility in Today's Business and The Good, the Bad, and Your Business: Choosing Right When Ethical Dilemmas Pull You Apart, is a lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at  Harvard's Kennedy School . 
Follow him on Twitter: @jseglin 
Do you have ethical questions that you need answered? Send them to rightthing@comcast.net. 
(c) 2014 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Can you tell a book by its cover blurbs?

If you've ever picked up a hardback or paperback book, you've no doubt read the cover blurbs -- short endorsements, usually from other writers, extolling what's good about the book and why you should read it. But what should a reader expect after reading these always glowing snippets?
Occasionally, I'm asked to write blurbs. After the most recent request, I indicated that I might consider the assignment. The author then asked, "What would you like to read to consider doing so?"
"The book," I responded. He promptly sent me a pdf of the page proofs, also indicating that he would have gladly sent just the introduction and a chapter or two. After reading the book, which turned out to be good, I sent him an endorsement. In thanking me, the author wrote, "You may be the first person in history to actually read the book for which you write a blurb."
He was joking, of course. Plenty of other people endorsing books take the time to read them before producing a blurb. I like to think that those who've blurbed my books in the past read the manuscripts I sent. However, it's not uncommon for blurbs to be written by people who never read the book. On occasion, published blurbs are not even the work of the person to whom they're ascribed. Some blurbers demand payment.
The right thing for authors and publishers to do is make every effort to use only blurbs from contributors who commit to reading the book. Knowingly publishing endorsements from people who haven't done so -- or even written their own blurb -- may be de rigueur in the publishing industry, but it's dishonest. At best, it's a hollow effort to help prospective readers make informed decisions.
As for readers, since there's no guarantee of baloney-proof blurbs, the right thing to do is take them with a grain of salt. After all, author and publisher are unlikely to use anything but positive blurbs on a book cover.
Better to dump the practice altogether if no effort is made to ensure that those endorsing books start doing so honestly. 
Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of  The Right Thing: Conscience, Profit and Personal Responsibility in Today's Business and The Good, the Bad, and Your Business: Choosing Right When Ethical Dilemmas Pull You Apart, is a lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at  Harvard's Kennedy School . 
Follow him on Twitter: @jseglin 
Do you have ethical questions that you need answered? Send them to rightthing@comcast.net. 
(c) 2014 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Excessive commencement cheering should not spell jail time

I've been to my fair share of commencement ceremonies. They're joyous, but usually very long events, often held outdoors in hot weather, or in humid auditoriums. Administrators regularly exhort graduates, their friends and family to keep their whooping and hollering in check. Some even warn that excessive cheering will lead to eviction from the event.
Every year, news reports spotlight overly enthusiastic supporters slammed with citations for disturbing the peace. Several years ago, I wrote about a couple of incidents that resulted in such arrests. In one case, administrators withheld diplomas from students whose families were deemed to have crossed the line.
While I think such responses are excessive, if the rules make clear that attendees can be ejected for excessive cheering, they should abide by the rules or expect to suffer the consequences.
Legal charges do seem over the top, though. And holding a student in cap and gown responsible for the behavior of family and friends in the stands? That's punishing the wrong person for the infraction.
Reports hit the news a few weeks ago of yet another commencement disturbance, this one in Senatobia, Miss. Arrest warrants were issued to four people for excessive cheering at the May 21 high school commencement ceremony. The Associated Press reported that Senatobia's school superintendent Jay Foster, "said that over the past few years, the yelling and screaming at graduation has become too disruptive, and made the ceremony unbearable." The AP also reported that charges brought against the revelers could result in "a fine of up to $500 and jail time of up to six months."
Foster acknowledged that he got "a lot of negative phone calls and emails" about the crackdown, but added that he'd also received a lot of support for his action. Support or no, less than three weeks later the complaints were withdrawn.
Foster and the school district did the right thing by withdrawing the complaints. Weighing the severity of the action, they wisely chose not to have the punishment exceed the "crime."
For the mother of one of those charged for cheering on his little sister at the ceremony, dismissal of the charges was not enough.
"I'm not done with him," Linda Walker told the AP, referring to Foster. Walker said she was talking to a lawyer and "it's going to cost them some money."
Just as the Senatobia school district has every right to enforce the rules it sets for commencement activities, Walker has every right to file suit over the incident, although doing so also seems excessive and another move that diverts attention from where it should be.
Unruly cheerers, the school district's actions in bringing charges rather than trying to better supervise graduation ceremonies (as hundreds of other schools do across the country) and Walker's actions detract from what should be at the heart of commencement: celebrating students' accomplishments.
The right thing is for attendees to tamp down their exuberance, administrators to find better ways to manage such events, and students to take pride in earning their diplomas. 

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of  The Right Thing: Conscience, Profit and Personal Responsibility in Today's Business and The Good, the Bad, and Your Business: Choosing Right When Ethical Dilemmas Pull You Apart, is a lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at  Harvard's Kennedy School . 

Follow him on Twitter: @jseglin 

Do you have ethical questions that you need answered? Send them to rightthing@comcast.net. 

(c) 2014 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Many happy returns to lost items

Judging from reader reports, people have a knack for misplacing wallets and purses --and how they respond when finding such items left behind by others says a lot about their character.
B.C., a reader from New England, wrote that he regularly spends time with old high school friends when they're home for a holiday. At one get-together, a friend told the group about the time he and his wife found a wallet on the beach. They removed the cash and tossed the wallet, with the owner's license and credit cards, in a dumpster.
Two people in the group "went nuts" over the story, telling the friend how wrong he was to care so little about the wallet's owner, and hammering him for the cavalier way he told the story.
"The friend was shamed to the point that he got up, left the bar, and we haven't spoken to him since," B.C. noted.
Janet experienced a far different scenario. When she and family were visiting Gettysburg, Penn., several years ago, her 13-year-old daughter spotted a small purse lying beside a tree. There was $20 to $40 in the purse and no identification. The visitor's center was closed, so they couldn't leave the purse in the lost and found.
The daughter insisted that they wait for more than an hour to see if the owner returned. When she didn't, the daughter placed the purse in the tree, hoping it would be obvious to the owner if she returned.
Another reader, S.K., recalled being at an Olive Garden restaurant in Ohio when she saw a woman leave the restroom just as S.K. was entering. S.K. noticed that the woman had left a purse behind. The ID information inside the purse matched the woman who'd left the restroom, but otherwise the purse contained only a wadded-up tissue, two gum wrappers and an empty coin purse.
"I took $20 out of my wallet and put it in the clutch," S.K. wrote. She then returned the purse to the woman, who was sitting in the restaurant with three young children. "She opened the clutch, looked up at me and got tears in her eyes," S.K. wrote.
At a gas station in Santa Rosa, Calif., reader A.L. and her husband noticed a wallet on the floor of a phone booth. (Apparently, some gas stations in Santa Rosa still have phone booths!) The wallet contained what appeared to be a month's worth of paycheck cash. The owner was nowhere in sight, so A.L. checked the info in the wallet and called the owner.
"The man who came to our door was a salmon fisherman," writes A.L. "He wanted to give us some reward money. But, inspired by the movie 'Pay It Forward,' we told him to just pay it forward to someone else who might need some help."
There's no one right way to return what isn't yours, but failing to at least try is wrong. The right thing is to do what you can to set things right -- with the hope that your action leads others to do the same. 
Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of  The Right Thing: Conscience, Profit and Personal Responsibility in Today's Business and The Good, the Bad, and Your Business: Choosing Right When Ethical Dilemmas Pull You Apart, is a lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at  Harvard's Kennedy School . 
Follow him on Twitter: @jseglin 
Do you have ethical questions that you need answered? Send them to rightthing@comcast.net. 
(c) 2014 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Ethical business behavior translates into more than profits

I'm often asked if good ethical behavior in business translates into profits.
Forty-five years ago, economist Milton Friedman famously wrote an article for The New York Times Magazine entitled, "The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase Profits." Some (including me) have argued that this might suggest that a business that boosts profits by any legal means is doing well even if it exhibits a total lack of social responsibility.
However, I'm convinced that even Friedman might acknowledge that if acting in a socially responsible way regularly increases business and profits, then such behavior is a good thing for business.
If a business exhibits socially irresponsible behavior, there's certainly a good chance some customers will take their business elsewhere. Goodbye profits.
I'm regularly reminded of how the behavior of those working in business affects how much business I do with their companies, or how often I shop one place instead of another.
Two recent experiences that involved businesses not charging me as much as they might have, or not selling me something they easily could have, drove the point home that when it comes to building profits, establishing long-term repeat business is critical.
A small incident at the bakery of an independent grocerystore resulted in the baker charging me 25 cents less than the price marked for each macaroon I'd ordered.
"I think you may have undercharged me," I told the baker. She came around the counter to look at the prices and commented, "Well, those were on sale until yesterday and I didn't realize we raised the price back up to normal." When I offered to pay the difference, she responded, "My mistake. Enjoy the cookies."
Later that weekend, I stopped at the small hardware storethat has been in our village for about a century. I needed to touch up the stain on some shingles that had suffered through a tough New England winter. I brought the 5-gallon container of stain from my last go at the shingles, hoping the clerk could match the color in a new can.
He asked if I had any stain left in the container.
"Some," I replied, "but I'm not sure it's still any good."
He opened container, stirred the contents around, and said, "It looks pretty good to me and you've still got a good gallon of stain in there. You need more than that?"
I didn't. He shook the stain up for me and handed it back, asking if I needed any wooden stirrers. He could have easily sold me a new $35 gallon of stain and I would have thought nothing of it. Instead, he charged me nothing, but helped me figure out what I needed, shook my hand, and said, "Stop in any time."
When businesses do the right thing -- even if it doesn't result in a sale -- can translate into customer loyalty and long-term profits. When I needed a new turnbuckle for a wooden screen door, I never considered going anywhere but the same hardware store. That the bakery happens to be on the way made a quick return stop there a no-brainer, as well. 
Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of  The Right Thing: Conscience, Profit and Personal Responsibility in Today's Business and The Good, the Bad, and Your Business: Choosing Right When Ethical Dilemmas Pull You Apart, is a lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at  Harvard's Kennedy School . 
Follow him on Twitter: @jseglin 
Do you have ethical questions that you need answered? Send them to rightthing@comcast.net. 
(c) 2014 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Think positive: Family reunion game should stress the ties that bind

Every few years, a large family in New England holds a family reunion in the summer. Siblings, cousins, parents, grandparents, children, aunts and uncles convene at one family member's home to reminisce, eat, catch up on one another's lives, and nurture strong family ties.
At each reunion, the host tries to come up with an event that focuses on the family's history. Usually, this is an entertaining game or challenge. While the goal is to engage younger family members in learning something about their heritage, some effort is made to challenge old-timers, too.
My reader, the hostess this year, is in the throes of planning. She's thinking about a game in which attendees have to match up names to a particular branch of the family tree. The challenge, she writes, is that there have been quite a few marriages, divorces and remarriages within this group. She doesn't want to hurt the feelings of newer spouses by including the names of former spouses on the family tree.
While those former spouses aren't invited to the event, many of their biological children will be there. The hostess also doesn't want to hurt the feelings of those children by leaving the name of a parent off the family tree.
In the past, games have avoided the issue of a family tree, focusing instead on historical milestones or wagers about such things as how many lawyers vs. teachers there are in the family. This year, however, the reader wants the family tree as the focal point.
"Would it be wrong to simply leave the ex-spouses off the tree?" she asks.
Even at the risk of hurting the feelings of current spouses, if the hostess truly wants a complete family tree, it doesn't seem right to leave out the ex-spouses. They might no longer be invited to such gatherings, but she's right to think their children might be offended if their parents were banished from the family story. (No amount of Photoshop tinkering can remove the fact that these parents were once members of the family.)
The reader has a few options. She could speak to both the current spouses and the children of ex-spouses about her plans in advance. She could find a creative way to engage family members in their shared history without focusing on a thick and leafy family tree that has been pruned.
Since the goal of the party is for everyone to gather, share memories and have fun, the right thing to do is to find a way to accomplish that without awkwardness about who's included and who's left out of the family saga. 
Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of  The Right Thing: Conscience, Profit and Personal Responsibility in Today's Business and The Good, the Bad, and Your Business: Choosing Right When Ethical Dilemmas Pull You Apart, is a lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at  Harvard's Kennedy School . 
Follow him on Twitter: @jseglin 
Do you have ethical questions that you need answered? Send them to rightthing@comcast.net. 
(c) 2014 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Blowing off invitations to graduation events is not an option

Commencement season is upon us, and with it typically come multiple events, dinners, parties and other gatherings for the family and friends of graduates. Often, such invitations come in multiples, and deciding which ones to accept can be challenging.
A reader from New England, an area quite congested with graduation ceremonies, writes that he finds himself invited to multiple events, many for the same date and time at different locations. None of the grads are close relatives, but many are the children of close friends. As the reader sorts through the invites to commencement programs, graduation dinners and parties, he doesn't want to disappoint any of the people who've invited him.
As the events draw closer, he has yet to respond to any of the invitations. He'd like to attend at least one event, but is concerned that limiting himself will hurt the feelings of other friends and their graduates.
"I figure if none of them hear from me, they won't plan on me being there," he writes. "(However), it gnaws at me that that might not be the best thing to do in response to all of these invitations. What if I really want to accept an invitation from someone who invited me after everyone else did? That doesn't seem right, either."
So, instead of deciding to accept or decline an invitation, he wonders, why not just offer no response?
"How can I decide which invitation to accept?" he asks. "And if I can't decide, is the best thing simply not to respond at all?"
The reader will have to answer the first question for himself. There's nothing wrong with choosing the event(s) he wants to attend -- if he wants to go to any at all -- based on whatever criteria he wants, regardless of when he received the invitation.
He could decide to go to the closest event, the one that promises to be the shortest, the one that features a speaker or campus he really wants to see, the one that might prove the most relaxed, the one likely to serve the best food, or the one that involves the people to whom he has the closest relationship.
If there are conflicting events and he can only choose one, there's nothing wrong with that. It's also perfectly fine if he decides not to attend any of the events. People turn down invitations all the time.
The right thing to do is respond to each invitation. Leaving his friends in the dark about whether or not he plans to attend should not be an option. Not responding to any of the invitations in hopes that friends will forget they invited him or assume he's not coming is akin to a toddler putting his hands in front of his eyes and assuming no one else can see him because he can't see them. The reader owes each friend a response.
He need not make up a reason for not attending an event. No good will comes of a lie. He should simply let his friends know he can't make it and wish them and their graduate all the best. 
Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of  The Right Thing: Conscience, Profit and Personal Responsibility in Today's Business and The Good, the Bad, and Your Business: Choosing Right When Ethical Dilemmas Pull You Apart, is a lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at  Harvard's Kennedy School . 
Follow him on Twitter: @jseglin 
Do you have ethical questions that you need answered? Send them to rightthing@comcast.net. 
(c) 2014 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Leave tenants out of fundraising drive

Years ago, I had a boss who regularly let employees know when one of his daughters was selling Girl Scout cookies. He'd send around the order sheet and we'd indicate how many boxes of Thin Mints, shortbread Trefoils, peanut butter Tagalongs, or other varieties we wanted. The daughter's sales benefited quite a bit from these purchases.
Near as I can tell, no one who didn't buy was ever penalized, say, with a testy performance review or a snide comment from the boss. Still, he was the boss, and distributing these order forms every year seemed to cross a line.
It was telling, perhaps, that no one else at the company ever tried to compete by bringing in his or her own daughter's order sheet. This was clearly the boss's turf. (It didn't help matters that the boss's daughter never took the orders herself or delivered the cookies to the office, which seemed like a dereliction of duty for a Girl Scout.)
By soliciting his direct reports to purchase cookies, employees could have perceived that to stay in the boss's favor, they needed to buy. Thankfully, the daughter eventually outgrew the Girl Scouts and the cookie drives ceased.
Earlier this week, a reader who rents an in-law apartment in her home told me she felt uncomfortable letting her tenants know that her grandson was raising funds for his Eagle Scout project. She was fine asking the tenants if they'd save cans and bottles for the boy so he could use the deposits to help fund his project, but she thought asking them to buy tie-dyed bandanas or attend a car wash would make the tenants feel obligated.
"I'm giving the family a break on the rent," the reader said. "I don't want them to think they're obligated to donate to my grandson's project if they don't really want to." She knew the tenants regularly set their cans and bottles out for recycling, so she figured asking for these wouldn't cost the tenants anything.
"Am I wrong to feel uncomfortable asking them if they want to contribute to my grandson's project?" she asks.
I believe she made a good call by not asking her tenants to contribute.
It's one thing to expect tenants to pull the trash cans to the curb or shovel their steps as part of the reasonable rent offered. These are things they agreed to when they first moved in. But the right thing to do is to stop short of asking the tenants to do anything that might be perceived as expected to maintain a good tenant-renter relationship.
There would be nothing wrong if the reader put a flier up in the neighborhood announcing the car wash, or if she posted information about the project and other fundraising activities to her Facebook page or other social media outlets. If the tenants see the information and decide to contribute, that's a choice they can make without either party perceiving there's a quid pro quo for doing so. 
Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of  The Right Thing: Conscience, Profit and Personal Responsibility in Today's Business and The Good, the Bad, and Your Business: Choosing Right When Ethical Dilemmas Pull You Apart, is a lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at  Harvard's Kennedy School . 
Follow him on Twitter: @jseglin 
Do you have ethical questions that you need answered? Send them to rightthing@comcast.net. 
(c) 2014 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Crossing professional boundaries can be scary

A family therapist had been working with a particular family for several years. Because she was seeing one of the younger children in the family as a client, she also grew to know the child's parents quite well. Eventually, the need for ongoing therapy was deemed unnecessary, but the parents still consulted with the therapist occasionally when they had a concern.
Recently, about a year after regular therapy sessions ended, the therapist received a call from the mother of the child she'd been seeing. The mother filled her on family affairs, but the purpose of the call was different. The family had found a new apartment they wanted to rent and the mother wondered if she could list the therapist as a character reference.
The therapist is torn. On one hand, she'd like to help the family. On the other, she wants to make sure she doesn't inappropriately cross any boundaries.
Much has been written about the need for psychotherapists to maintain clear boundaries with their clients. Even more has been written about Sigmund Freud's views and those of others on the boundaries needed to develop and maintain effective treatment for clients or patients. Yet many therapists still find themselves facing questions about whether and when to something for a client that goes beyond the one-on-one therapy that's the primary focus of their relationship.
Freud himself, according to an article in the American Journal of Psychiatry by Thomas G. Gutheil and Glen O. Gabbard, is reported to have "sent patients postcards, lent them books, gave them gifts, corrected them when they spoke in a misinformed manner about his family members, provided them with extensive financial support in some cases, and on at least one occasion gave a patient a meal."
Just because Freud might have done so from time to time, however, doesn't mean that it's the right thing to do.
Licensed psychotherapists have professional codes of ethics. These are typically not specific enough to address every situation, however, nor do they replace a therapist's good judgment in making a decision. Still, these codes are a good first source of counsel on making such decisions as the one posed by the therapist who contacted me.
While I'm not a psychotherapist, it seems wise to set up clear boundaries with clients at the outset of their therapy (or in the case of children, to set those boundaries with their parents or guardians). Even then, situations will likely arise when the therapist has to make a choice of whether to stretch the boundaries of the relationship.
In the case of the therapist asked for a character reference, the right thing to do is to think through whether serving in such a role compromises anything about the therapeutic relationship. It would also be wise to consult with trusted colleagues for feedback on the matter.
The most important thing is to determine what's in the best interests of the client, and that doesn't undermine the ongoing professional relationship. The therapist did this very thing and ultimately agreed to provide the reference. 
Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of  The Right Thing: Conscience, Profit and Personal Responsibility in Today's Business and The Good, the Bad, and Your Business: Choosing Right When Ethical Dilemmas Pull You Apart, is a lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at  Harvard's Kennedy School . 
Follow him on Twitter: @jseglin 
Do you have ethical questions that you need answered? Send them to rightthing@comcast.net. 
(c) 2014 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

"Lost" jewelry suddenly found poses an ethical dilemma

Readers can't seem to hold onto their jewelry.
A reader from South Carolina once told me that after losing one diamond earring from a pair, she received a cash settlement from her insurance company, then felt guilty that she was able to find a replacement earring for far less than the settlement. She had no reason to feel guilty.
Another reader from Ohio told me he'd been trying for 40 years to repay the insurance company that cut him check for what he thought was a lost diamond ring which showed years after the settlement. The company acknowledged his request but never asked him to return the money. He did the right thing by persistently contacting the insurance company.
Now, a reader from Texas writes that she lost a diamond engagement ring and wedding band set. (Diamonds, in particular, seem to be hard to hold onto.)
"The set disappeared from my home," she writes. "After what I thought was a thorough search, we reported this missing jewelry to our insurance company." She'd insured the set for its full value on her homeowner's insurance policy.
The reader sent her insurance company the appraisal for the ring set. Not long after, she received a settlement for the value of the set and quickly found a nearly identical ring and band.
"I was very pleased," she writes.
Of course, the reader then found her missing rings.
"The ethical problem is, do I call the insurance company and return the replacement rings? Or do I not return them and convince myself that this was just the insurance functioning as we'd paid for the policy to do?" she writes.
If the reader is seeking legal advice, she's chosen the wrong fellow. I'm not a lawyer, nor am I an expert on insurance. If she's worried about breaking the law by not notifying her insurance company about finding the rings, she should contact a lawyer. Most states have a statute of limitations on insurance fraud. But it's unlikely that finding the rings for which the reader was reimbursed within a year of losing them would meet such requirements.
Even if it did, the right thing to do is contact the insurance company, reveal that she's found the rings she assumed were lost, and work with company to make things right.
The reader is correct that her insurance coverage functioned as it should to help replace her lost jewelry. But once she found the rings on which she'd placed a claim, it's up to her to let the insurance company know what happened. 
Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of  The Right Thing: Conscience, Profit and Personal Responsibility in Today's Business and The Good, the Bad, and Your Business: Choosing Right When Ethical Dilemmas Pull You Apart, is a lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at  Harvard's Kennedy School . 
Follow him on Twitter: @jseglin 
Do you have ethical questions that you need answered? Send them to rightthing@comcast.net. 
(c) 2014 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.