| I work as a consultant out of my home, doing a variety of
research, writing and editing tasks for five or six clients at a
time. Much of what I do for one client also helps me with others,
since the topics are in the same domain. If I spend a day
researching something for Client A and can use the same
information for Client B, may I charge both of them the
consulting fee? -- Nancy V. Yinger, Oakton, Va.
You may. It's fine -- and all but inevitable -- to apply
information gleaned while working for Client A to your work for
Client B (excluding any proprietary information, of course). And
it's fine to charge each client a consulting fee for, well,
consulting. The client is paying for your expertise. How you
acquire it is neither here nor there. Someone good at her job is
apt to learn more with experience, a fine thing.
What you may not do is bill the same hour multiple times: One
hour of work earns you one hour of pay. It would be more accurate
and more honest to prorate an hour of research among several
clients if it contributes to your work for all or to charge each
client a flat fee. And it would be prudent to explain your
billing system when you accept a job.
In a post-Newtonian world, it is tempting to bill the same
hour's work to dozens of clients, enabling you to work 25 hours
in a magical, Einsteinian day -- or 28 hours or a million. And
when you finish the job and return to Earth, you'll find that
you're younger than when you set out. And blonder. I don't
understand how it works -- I think you have to do research at the
speed of light -- I'm just glad it does.
I sit on the board of an international youth organization. Our
drug-and-alcohol policy is up for review, and we are considering,
in addition to measures we already take when youth participants
consume banned substances at our programs, informing the
participant's school of the transgression. May we pass along this
information? -- E.Z., New York
You should not pass it along. To do so invites a kind of
double jeopardy. Having already punished a young person for
misbehaving, you invite his or her school to put the boot in,
too. It's hard to see why this is any of their business, yet some
schools will no doubt punish a student even for actions taken off
school premises and outside of school hours.
You have an obligation to your young participants (and their
parents) to provide a safe and lawful environment. To do that,
you may ban illegal drugs and alcohol at your events and expel
those who flout your rules. But to best protect -- and assist --
those participants, you would do well to distinguish among the
various transgressions you might encounter.
A 19-year-old drinking a beer or two at a party is unlikely to
have a health problem. In many countries, he or she would not
have even a legal problem. (Buy that beer in Detroit, you flirt
with crime; cross the Ambassador Bridge and buy it in Windsor,
Ontario, you're in the clear.) But a drug-addled 10-year-old very
likely does have a health problem, one that requires not
punishment but help, something best overseen by parents and not
assistant principals (and certainly not the police).
UPDATE: The board voted not to report violations to a
transgressor's school except as required by law.
(Readers can direct their questions and comments by e-mail to
ethicist@nytimes.com. This column originates in
The New York Times Magazine.)
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