Focusing on environmental monetary wealth, we define abundant
wealth as a large pool of visible money or resources that are
either shared by organizational members or possessed by individuals
within the organization. Notably, organizational wealth is
rarely distributed equally across employees. An organization may
create a wealthy environment for the benefit of key employees
and customers, yet many workers who operate in this wealthy
environment may share few of its rewards. We suggest that the
presence of abundant wealth leads to perceptions of inequity
among those who operate in the wealthy environment without
sharing in its largesse. In turn, these perceptions of negative inequity
induce feelings of envy that motivate unethical behaviors such
as theft and deceptive overstatement of performance. Thus, inescapable
comparisons between a wealthy environment and one’s
own financial condition can motivate employees to engage in
unethical activities they might otherwise avoid. This ‘‘abundance
effect” consequently may yield higher levels of unethical behavior
under conditions of abundant wealth than in conditions of scarcity.