Spitzer slams executive pay

[UpInArms]

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story.asp?guid=%7BA2275E65%2D3EC3%2D4534%2DA45C%2D431B026EAAAA%7D&siteid=mktw

SEATTLE (MarketWatch) -- Compensation for top corporate executives is "out of control," but doing something about it is up investors, not regulators, Eliot Spitzer said Monday night.

"Shareholders have to step up to the plate," Spitzer, New York state's attorney general, said at the annual meeting of the Society of American Business Editors and Writers in Seattle.

Spitzer's office has taken on executive pay before in the case of former New York Stock Exchange boss Richard Grasso. Because the NYSE is a nonprofit organization, it is under the jurisdiction of his office. That case is set to go to trial in state court.

"We won't settle and we won't negotiate," Spitzer said. Spitzer is suing Grasso to return more than $100 million of a $189 million compensation package.

...more...

Kick 'em again, Eliot! :yourock:

[sendero]

1. I'd like to place an order..

.... for 1,000 more men like Spitzer in public service. :)

[denverbill]

6. Ditto. He seems to be one of the few Democrats that work for plain folks.

Other Democrats are too busy taking donations from drug companies, banks, and other corporations to bother giving a damn about the little people. Republicans are even worse, but enough of it goes on with Democrats to ruin whatever difference there is between the parties at times.

[Warpy]

2. He failed to use the word "embezzlement," which

is what those executive pay packages really constitute. Increased productivity has been shared with neither the workers who created it nor the investors who were supposed to profit from it, it's all being raked off the top by top management.

Don't we still have a few laws against this stuff?

[orwell]

4. Productivity...

is the result of many things, but it is primarily due to the invention of labor saving devices or methods.

That being said, workers receive almost zero benefit from increases in productivity. It is more than offset by unreported inflation, which greatly affects those on the lower ends of the economic ladder, who are the least likely to hold productive assets (capital), and generally benefits the asset holding class. As workers have lost the bulk of their leverage due to the planned and well executed destruction of unions and the inevitable beggar thy neighbor policy of outsourcing, they also lose any ability to demand a piece of the productivity pie. Global capital has decided that all spoils go to the victor because they can. After all, the dumbed down masses are busy worrying about the runaway bride, not runaway prices.

The main reason for the skyrocketing compensation for those at the top is the almost absurd lack of competition, a hallmark of crony capitalism, and extremely favorable tax policies which generally began under Reagan, as a direct payoff to the Republican party's enablers.

[orwell]

5. One Other Thing...

In a normal market environment, one that wasn't rigged to benefit the few, the payoff to workers for the increase in productivity should be in lower prices for goods and services, effectively leveraging their stagnant take home pay. But because the Federal Reserve and other debt fueled forces are at work virtually guaranteeing gross levels of structural inflation, said price decreases are not allowed to occur. Add to that the investor demands for constantly rising quarter to quarter profit growth and you can see where any benefits from productivity are "pre-earmarked" to the asset holders, whether they sit in the boardroom or on a seat at the exchange.

[LiberalEsto]

7. Productivity means more work pressure

more unpaid overtime, more stress, more demands to do the job of two or three people while being paid only for one.

My husband works at a big company where the computer people routinely are forced to work 60 to 70 hour weeks, without overtime or comp time, under constant pressure, to bring projects in on unrealistically short deadlines set by their managers. Complain, and you're replaced by someone from India on an H1B visa.

There is no reward for doing this work, except that a) you get to keep your job; b) you never see your family, have time to see the dentist, or even get your hair cut; and c) you get stress and ulcers. Someone in my husband's company recently collapsed from stress after working 21 days without a break.

However the managers and VPs pull in enormous bonuses -- tens of thousands of dollars -- for forcing their underlings to meet these ridiculous deadlines. Do the underlings get a cut of this? No way, except maybe a $50 little bonus once a year.

That's what "productivity" is all about.

[orwell]

9. A Reason

A reason that they can get away with this is because of the competition from lower paid workers. This is not going to go away as long as we view labor as subservient to capital.

But even this case of extreme demands on workers is a very small component of real productivity increases. Compare said overwork to inventions such as the jacquard loom or the discovery of electricity and you will understand what I am talking about. For instance, the work that can be performed by one gallon of gasoline is hundreds of times that than the work per hour that can be performed by a human.

I am not negating what you are saying, just pointing out that in the larger scheme of things, overworking employees contributes orders of magnitude less to productivity than improvements in methods or means of production.

The point still stands that workers receive very little benefit from said productivity increases due to political and social arrangements. The question that should be asked is why.

[lovuian]

3. It is absolutely scandelous!!!

Corporate greed has gone rampant!!!

[CottonBear]

8. "We won't settle and we won't negotiate," Spitzer said.

Now those are fighting words! You go go get 'em Eliot!
:woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo: