Quite a lot actually:
The McDonald’s policy forbids “any kind of intimate relationship between employees in a direct or indirect reporting relationship”. But why?
Because that’s how sexual mores work in the United States.
They’ve moved from the secretary being hired so she can be shagged (alleged for JFK, confirmed for at least one Congressman) to the idea that sex is about power, or can be. Therefore no one can truly give consent to someone who has power over them – the secretary hired so that the boss could shag her. Or, the secretary who gets unhired because she won’t shag the boss.
Whether it should be this way is another matter but this is the way it is. Boeing fired their CEO for stepping across this line. No shagging someone when you have power over their continued employment.
Easterbrook’s – alleged – mistake was not the shagging. It was breaching one of the well known conditions of his employment.