When the New York Times ran an article about GE's use of tax loop holes to not pay taxes, GE's brand reputation was significantly hurt and took two months to return to precrisis levels. However, just a month later the New York Times ran a similar story about Apple and Apple did not see the same result as GE.

Apple, as opposed to GE, saw an increase in brand reputation after the New York Times story ran. On YouGov's rating system, Apple went up from a brand reputation of 52 to 58 and is now running at 51. The reputation scores range from -100 to 100 and is calculated off of responses to the question of whether or not they would be "proud or embarrassed to work for this brand."

Apple's reputation is "virtually Teflon," in that nothing sticks to it. "The reaction [to the story about GE] was more pronounced and longer: the company's reputation took a steep drop and two months to recover to precrisis levels," YouGov said in a post. It's incredible that the two companies are treated differently, even though they do the same thing.