Interesting the banks would rather fail than accept TARP money and the attached compensation limitations. Then again...I suspect the CEOs aren't polling the rank and file employees at the banks who would stand to lose their jobs in a TARP-less failure and who are without a golden parachute and who also don't have a prayer of earning 1/2 of $500,000.00 in annual wages. I would have to guess over 90% of Citigroup's employees fall into the category so described? Of course....no one at the top really cares what the rank and file thinks anyway.
Nonsense......can you say private sector? The government is the LAST entity from whom any rational business want to accept investment capital unless there is no other option. The fateful meeting between Paulsen, Geightner and the large bank CEO's ended with the bankers much preferring to take their cases to the private sector investment community.....they were told in quite forceful terms that they would take the TARP money and like it......to stabilize the system for the good of the country. Logically, how this will play out, is that those firms with investment cases compelling enough to attract the private sector capital (read that the best and strongest) will pay out Uncle Sam to get out from under his arbitrary, foolish and onerous thumb and Uncle (read that us the taxpayer) will be stuck with those with no other option and with limited prospects for success.......brilliant. This administration is clueless about how OUR system works......it ain't perfect, but it is the best resource allocation mechanism the world has ever known....... "Now is not the time for profits!" WTF, are you kidding me? Where in the f^&K does he think the money is going to come from to pay back the Treasury - i.e., TARP money Where in the f^&k does he think the money comes from to make new investment, build new plants, expand production, engage in R&D, develop new medicines, hire new workers, explore new energy sources, roll out new products??????? This ain't the Soviet Union......that money comes from earnings, good old fashioned profits. The notion that "profit" is a dirty word is as socialist as socialist gets.......this is scary stuff folks. Oh and by the way for our liberal friends, profits and earnings are also the dominant source of our tax revenues.....so in some bizarre kind of way, libs can't live their lives without profits!
I can tell you from first hand experience that that statement is absolute unadulterated bullsh!t so steeped in ignorance that common sense alone should prevent it's mere utterance..... Any company that has any intentions of being successful over time is deeply concerned about their "rank and file" and indeed spend an inordinate amount of time and energy trying to determine EXACTLY what they're thinking and feeling.....it is in everyones own self-interest to do so.....if you don't treat your people well, you won't have them or you will have only those that have no other options. If you don't have good people, you cannot manufacture good products or provide good service to your clents......if you can't do those fairly important items, you will find it extraordinarily difficult to generate sales, and on it goes......no enterprise successful over time can behave in the manner that you so often naively describe.....our system will not allow it to sustain. You have no clue.......you should be in the cabinet.
Guess I'm feeling that my company didn't care too much for the rank and file.... Any openings in the cabinet? 8) ....keeping my cool... 8)
.....and if that is true, they are very foolish, short-sighted leaders and that company cannot possibly be successful over any sustained period of time. Krebise, you're a business leader, is it true that those at the top don't give a flip about the rank and file?
.....nor clever enough to pay their "rank and file" to hang out in a "job bank" and not to work ala GM. No doubt the "rank and file" at most companies don't feel as deeply cared for by their labor and company leaders as ,say for example, do those that work at the domestic auto makers. :?:
My company used to do pretty well in taking care of the employee.. especially the top performing employee.....but after 23 years and you get shown the door it turns you a little bitter. I was in the top 5-10% of sales out of 150 or so salespeople for the past 12 years running.....
can we cap the pay of UAWs now? I don't so much have a problem with the line worker making what he does (although it is absurdly high). I have a beef with the guy who mows the lawn making what the line worker does...
I guess this lady just didn't get BT's memo that all highly paid Wall Streeters must be high performers who earn every penny of their high incomes: http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/04/minow.executive.pay/index.html
....don't be an a$$. If you're going to quote me at least do it with some degree of accuracy. Those words never crossed my lips and you have no freakin' clue of which you speak.....so I guess the moral of the story is if you're going to be an a$$, it's better to be an ignorant a$$. I suppose if it were up to President Obama and his comrades the federal government would set pay standards for everyone.....why not? We've taken the first step......economies throughout time have always thrived on central planning. It's a great and wonderful thing......this is scary stuff boys. It is full on class warfare with a socialist agenda hiding behind an economic crisis. The man is demonizing capitalism and casting blame on Wall Street as if they were the only relevant factor in the current situation.....Wall Street bears no more blame than does Capitol Hill and CRA and HMDA......Morgan Stanley, et al bears less blame than Fannie and Freddie and at the end of the day, the consumer that borrowed more of somebody else's money than he is able to pay back sits at the center of the crisis and is likely, in many scenarios, to be made whole. The notion that if I lend you money and you either can't or won't pay it back and a bad situation develops as a result has me as the guilty party is complete and unadulterated bullsh!t......the bully pulpit is a powerful thing. Has personal accountability gone completely out the window with the administration? It's always somebody else's fault and the most fault has to lay with the guy with the deep pockets? Watch out fellas, dentists, lawyers, small business owners are square in his sights.....
I own a small business... I don't think I could call my staff "rank and file" but I do care for them very much. Probably to a fault. As far as the executive salary caps, I have no problem with that provision as I understand it now. I find corporate largesse in these companies who have been bailed out to be unseemly and wasteful, to say the least. And lets not forget, the government is not bailing anyone out.... you and I are. That is our money and from my catbird seat I think any one of these folks can scrape by on $500K as long as my dollar is keeping them afloat.
BT...all I am saying is that there are one helluva lot more people criticizing exorbitant...inflated.....pick a term....Wall Street compensation than just Obama. Did you read the link? And....I am inferring that some of those being highly compensated in such a crucial time for those firms do not necessarily have a stellar performance record or one that deserves what they are being paid. Maybe you have a record or inside info that would provide verification that the only ones getting rich deserve it based on individual performance ( can't be company performance at this point ) but I doubt that you really can do that. http://money.cnn.com/2009/02/04/news/economy/executive_compensation/index.htm?postversion=2009020418 "Alexander Cwirko-Godycki, research manager for executive compensation research firm Equilar, said that the U.S. public, not just Corporate America, has been reluctant to accept anything that smacks of pay caps in the past. But he said that the mood is now changing. "In this case, it's the first time it's palatable to most people. There's a total lack of trust on Main Street for Wall Street," he said."
I read the link and dozens like and scores on the opposite side....none of the writers are the President of the United States and have world-wide press coverage 24/7. He is demonizing only one element of the toxic cocktail that created this mess......if you believe that this train wreck's only father was Wall Street you are wrong or misinformed or both. Period. I don't hear Obama railing against the nuclear wasteland created by his buddy Franklin Raines at Fannie Mae.....who may be at the top of the list of offenders creating massive wealth for himself and his posse as the head of a GSE (read that government sponsored enterprise). What Raines oversaw at Fannie and the resulting meltdown was criminal and well beyond anything the demons on Wall Street over saw, but don't hold your breath waiting for any indictments...... There are tons of Wall Streeters who as a result of their performance for their firm and its owners are no longer working and/or incentives were not earned and their net worth tied up in company stock has been crushed......I'm unaware of any of the senior executives at any major Wall Street firm that is getting a bonus this year.....I am aware of many Wall Streeters who as a result of their performance for their firm and its owners rightfully and justly earned incentives and the agreements under which they are employed provide for them.....contrary to what you read or hear not all Wall Streeters participated equally or at all in the businesses that were tied to the housing and credit debacle, yet they are all being lumped as one in the Obama demon bucket and compensation that was justly earned is at risk of being denied them by the demonization of an entire industry. Surely the guys on the oil trading desk, or the staff advising corporate clients in Asia or the guys on the currency desks facilitating international trade in Europe or the guys on the bond desk dealing with the Treasury financing needs or the guys working with the Fed to assist in the open market operations necessary to manage the nation's money supply, etc, etc do not share the same guilt with the underwriters who mixed a little sub-prime, with a little Alt-A, and God knows what from Raines at Fannie, wrapped in a credit default swap from AIG, got it rated AAA by S&P and sold it as good as gold to widows and orphans........yet they are being all being pointed at with the same bony finger of indignation. It's crap..... Everybody bitching and moaning about compensation on Wall Street are free to go and compete for a job there.....it is a very competitive place. The unskilled, unmotivated, incapable of making money or adding value don't last long..... It's scary fellas....it's all out class warfare and wealth redistribution right out of Marxist dogma.....surely I'm not the only one that sees this???????