On December 11, a fire nearly destroyed, Malden Mills the basic economic source in Lawrence, Massachusetts, owned by Aaron Feuerstein (pictured right). This Fire nearly put 3000 people out of work. Aaron Feuerstein grew up in Lawrence, Mass as a young Jewish training to take of his father's company. He grew up being told to put the "people before profits, " which is exactly what he did after the fire nearly destroyed the 90 year old company. Instead of collecting his fire insurence money and selling his company to make a profitor moving it overseas where wages are a lot less he stayed in Lawrence, Mass. and told his workers he would pay each of them there month's salary of $12.50 an hour. Not only did he do this for one month but for three, costing him millions of dollar. One worker and his wife said this about it: Later in November of 2001 Feuerstein filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy. He later came out of it in 2002. In March of that year during an interview on "60 Minutes" he was asked if he knew how things would have played out would he have done the same thing. His answer was: The press loved him, and so did politicians. President Clinton invited him to the State of the Union Address as an honored guest. He also received 12 honorary degrees, including one from Boston University. According to the skipressworld.com, Aaron Feuerstein announced a new organization plan that would bring them out of bankruptcy and allow Feuerstein to by back Malden Mills over a period of three years. On July 13 Aaron Feuerstein under went surgery for an aortic dissection, the same condition that killed television actor John Ritter (From the Eagle Tribune on Tuesday, August 3, 2004). Sources:
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 Aaron Feuerstein is a great moral buisness hero in my eyes for many reasons. The biggest one is because he did not move his company overseas so that the workers wages would be a whole lot less. He also did not lay anybody off so that he would not go bankrupt. The people who did not end up getting their jobs back he paid them full wages until they found a job. Feuerstein put the people before the profits which is something that you do not see very often any more. People should take his example of being a moral business hero and treat their workers like real people and not just workers. I also think that he was a man of Faith. He brought his Jewish Faith into his decision to continue to pay his workers after the fire. Normally CEO's of companies try not to mix their certain religous faith with their buisness, but Feuerstein did. He mixed the two together and shook them up a lot. |
