OK I've got another one.
My father in law is generally a nice and upstanding guy, but he's one of these guys who LOVES getting things for free and will do almost anything to get a bargain.
So one of the things he does every week is that he goes to the local grocery store and picks up their leftover baked goods and expired dairy stuff for delivery to a local food bank/shelter, for distribution to needy families. Nice, pro-social behavior? Certainly!
However, I recently found out that, when he does this, he routinely sorts through the stuff that the bakery give him and keeps all the best stuff for his house--the good whole grain breads, the best-looking pies and pastries, the high quality yogurts, etc. The only stuff that he brings to the shelter is the leftovers--the plain white bread, smashed or broken pies and pastries, etc. And he's keeping the rest for himself. I have no idea if the grocery store or the shelter know that this is what's happening.
Now, a couple of things here--the food wouldn't get to the shelter if my FIL wasn't willing to go pick it up every week and deliver it, so poor people are being made better off. However, my FIL is solidly middle-class, and can easily afford to buy all this stuff on his own--he just does it because he loves getting things for free. And I strongly suspect that that's his whole motivation for picking up and delivering the food in the first place.
So is it ethical for him to do this, or not?
As a follow-up, the way I found this out was that one week he wasn't available to do this pickup, and asked me to do it in his stead. He specifically told me to keep out all the "good stuff", and give the rest to the shelter. I didn't, and gave everything to the shelter, then told him that they didn't have any of the stuff he liked that week. Was it ethical of me to lie to him, even if it meant giving more food to people who really needed it, instead of cherry pies to my middle class (not to mention diabetic!) father in law?