Angry senator wants pay cap on Wall Street 'idiots'

Source: CNN

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- One day after President Barack Obama ripped Wall Street executives for their "shameful" decision to hand out $18 billion in bonuses in 2008, Congress may finally have had enough.

An angry U.S. senator introduced legislation Friday to cap compensation for employees of any company that accepts federal bailout money. Under the terms of a bill introduced by Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Missouri, no employee would be allowed to make more than the president of the United States.

Obama's current annual salary is $400,000.

"We have a bunch of idiots on Wall Street that are kicking sand in the face of the American taxpayer," an enraged McCaskill said on the floor of the Senate. "They don't get it. These people are idiots. You can't use taxpayer money to pay out 18 billion dollars in bonuses."



Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/01/30/executive.pay/in...

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Fuckin' A Right!

If the company can maintain profit that way and it thinks he's worth it then be my guest. But if they need my taxes to stay afloat $400,000 might be too generous.

I think they truly can get away with it...if they cap them then they will find a way around it.

How dare they behave as if Bush and his criminals were still in office. The entire country wants these guys punished and humiliated so let's go for it!

citizens' rights

And all Congress has done is throw more money at them.

And, yes, they'll spend their time trying to find a way around it to get their "just due", I'm sure. Instead of, say, focusing on their company.

n/t

Because that is just what it is. Or fraud....lying to congress about what you need the loan for, and then using it for something else.

If corporate entityhood as a person is granted in the consitution, methinks this is the equivalent of someone who takes a damn good loan to avoid so claimed bankruptcy and buys a Porche with the dough.

I've had one of Citibanks "student loans" in the past. They floated that rate so freaking high, it felt more like indentured servitude.

who are the so called "Big Swinging Dicks" will want to start investment companies in which the banks invest. Then the investment companies pay the bonuses to the BSDs.

The difference this time is everybody's watching. And the guy in the White House won't just wink at them and go, "heh, heh, heh."

I think so of the Wall street guys should be in jail, but i don't think we need a pay cap.

This is a free country, if you work hard you can be rich and successful.

If you sit on your ass awaiting your welfare check..thats another story.

Alot of people are hurting in this country, and they to with hard work will recover.

America is not the welfare country....we work hard for the things we have and that is what has made us great.

Times are rough, but through hard work we will be a rich nation again.

She's proposing we put a cap on failure. This isn't a pay cap for all executives. It's just the ones who did such a poor job that their banks have to beg the government for a handout.

Lamborghinis.

The industry has been rife with criminal fraud for years, and thousands of them should be locked up.

and believe me .. they will.

Shameful are the bonus takers and givers of such bonuses, but idiots they are not.

Thanks Sen McCaskill for saying it for us!!!

but I think the members of the Senate and House are like the CEOs that are getting away with it. They figure we will forget about it. They know the story will be buried under the football scores and American Idol results, and that we will drift back to the numb sleep of the recently screwed.

Gosh, I would like to be proven wrong on this. Come on Senator McCaskill. Bring it to the floor and lets have a roll call vote.

They made sure there was no accountability when the legislation for plunder was passed. Most of their political careers are financed by such thieves.

the Congress -need big money to pay for TV ads to get re-elected, so THEY are unlikely to fight this fight with real conviction, beyond grandstanding.
Change our system so that not just the wealthy can run for office and we might someday see a difference in the laws (and the tax -loophole- codes)
Ask your congressperson to demand again that which once belonged to the people -the TV airwaves- and elections won't cost so much.

a window and yell "We're mad as hell, and we're not gonna take it anymore!" Ah well, I suppose that a start...

No chance the Corporate Dems will ever put up with this

Wall street execs sleep in Castles

Homeless Vets sleep in cardboard boxes

This may well pass, Americans are very angry.

The limit maybe raised from $400,000 to $500,000, but that's about it.

America wants these execs to really "suffer" with such low wages. IMO

but most Americans live in a perpetual state of apathy and ignorance.

From Reuters:


Obama Unlikely to Toughen Wall Street Pay Rules:

http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE50U0R3200...

... the graph of CEO v Average Worker Wage from 1936-2005 morphs into something like this


http://good-times.webshots.com/photo/272306139008208434... >

And who most assuredly isn't?

And it looks like no one is stopping them.

"Idiots" indeed!

on edit: I wish I were that "idiotic."

Could they add a provision for faith based ministers that receive federal money as well?
I'm tied in knots because I just found out Obama plans to continue this practice.

Bill Berkowitz
January 28, 2006
$14 million in federal faith-based money goes to Pat Robertson
Televangelist's claim that Ariel Sharon's stroke was an act of God may have cost him the friendship of some Israelis, but it hasn't prevented his charity, Operation Blessing, from garnering faith-based grants from the U.S. government
...
"More than 380,000 CBN 'partners' who donate a minimum of $20 per month ... are the bedrock of CBN, which attracted more than $132 million in donations in 2004," the Times-Dispatch reported.

Finding funds and thriving through faith-based grants

Despite the near universal condemnations of Robertson's remarks, back in Virginia Beach, Virginia -- where his ventures have their headquarters -- it was business as usual. Especially for Operation Blessing, the charitable entity whose mission is to "demonstrate God's love by alleviating human need and suffering in the United States and around the world."

In January 2001, when President Bush announced his Faith-Based Initiative by issuing an executive order establishing the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Organizations, and one that instructed the Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, Justice, Education and Housing and Urban Development to set up Centers for Faith-Based and Community Initiatives within their agencies, the Rev. Robertson -- along with his buddy, the Rev. Jerry Falwell -- roundly criticized the project.
...
Robertson changed his tune the following year, when in October 2002, Tommy Thompson, then the head of the Department of Health and Human Services awarded a $500,000 Compassion Capital Fund grant to Robertson's Operation Blessing International.

Five years later, "the federal government has become a major source of money for Operation Blessing ... In two years, the group's annual revenue from government grants has ballooned from $108,000 to $14.4 million," the Virginian-Pilot's Bill Sizemore recently reported.
http://www.mediatransparency.org/story.php?storyID=108

They knew these mortgage backed securities were garbage. Goldman Sachs was selling MBS's to municipalities and pension funds in one room, and shorting them in another. It was a conspiracy to defraud. The criminals at the Fed allowed it, and the former Sec of Treasury started the whole ball rolling when he ran Goldman.

Goldman Sachs, financial terrorists committing Jihad right from Wall St USA.

... welcome to DU!

Welcome to DU.

Perhaps RICO charges can be filed. Maybe some of those municipalities can pursue civil and criminal cases.

And should be, though the statute of limitations is running quickly.

If the execs want to "leave" for another position, let them go, and I wish them well in finding a financial institution that hasn't been bailed out by the taxpayer.

Fuck them with a stick.

The law would read something like the total of all compensation received, whether in salary, in kind, in bonuses, perks of all kinds, including insurance of any kind, deferred payments of any kind, stock or stock options of any kind, in short, the total of any and all value received by each employee of all grades and titles cannot exceed $400,000 per year, and violations of the intent of this policy will be punishable by 10 years in federal prison for each recipient, and 10 years in federal prison for the CEO of the company for each violation, as well. This way, just planning to circumvent it is illegal, not just actually circumventing it.

At last -- we're going to FIGHT BACK against these greedy
bastards!

CLASS WARFARE -- BRING IT ON!

I'm laughing out loud, in a mean menacing way!

If you can't manage your company with enough skill to avoid needing such a bailout, then you certainly don't deserve to make more than $400k a year.

If you want to the sky to be the limit, then don't look for handouts from the gov't.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEah7_lzsOU

Along with Operation Chaos, proof positive of Limpball's glowing record fighting against the Democratic Party! Keep it up OxyMoran!!!

prove me wrong, Congress and Obama- please! But I've seen this kind of talk before and at the end of the day the rich have always gotten richer.

I *KNEW* this would happen. That is why I was against the Bailout. I did not believe it would be "trinkle down", but that we would only be peed on and I posted this when it all started ...that we the taxpayers would be peed on.

Why the hell didn't they see it?

Thank her for sticking up for us...

"You can't use taxpayer money to pay out 18 billion in bonuses."

AMEN

These asses have ruled the roost for far too long

Off with their heads

FUCKIN' A


Jeff

...but if they don't get this crap under control soon, I'll have no objections when an angry mob beats some of these turds to a bloody pulp! Enough!!

For the very first time, she's made me happy to say:

That's MY Senator!

More correctly, it failed to stop its automatic pay raise. Congress gets a pay raise every year -- unless it votes to not take it. This year, it didn't vote to turn down the raise.

So, demands for caps on other people's pay -- while I think it's a good idea -- are a little hypocritical.

The base Congressional salary this year is $174K. Majority and Minority Leaders get $193.4K. Pelosi gets $223.5K.

I don't think members of Congress are overpaid, particularly when compared to corporate executives.

The proposed cap is a great idea. Executive compensation has gotten way out of hand and I don't see any other way to get it under control.

Edit to furnish link: http://usgovinfo.about.com/library/weekly/aa031200a.htm

"If you somehow take that bonus out of the economy, it really will create unemployment," he said on CNN's "American Morning." "It means less spending in restaurants, less spending in department stores, so everything has an impact."

They couldn't make it on $400,000 a year? They obviously have no clue about what the average person goes through.

What an absolute asshat. ThinkProgress had a good column on that:


Even as he was pushing for more billions to be handed out to failing businessmen, Giuliani railed against President Obama’s tax cuts for the poor: “That’s not stimulating the economy, that’s solving some kind of social agenda.” He was more explicit last week, condemning the tax cuts as “welfare” with Fox News’ Sean Hannity:

GIULIANI: Yes, if — somebody is not paying taxes is going to get a check from the government, then that is welfare. You haven’t earned it, that’s a welfare payment. I think he’s going to have to abandon that in light of the economic situation.

HANNITY: Are you thinking that he’s really — he’s going to abandon all these things?

GIULIANI: I think so.

Conservatives raised the “welfare” scarecrow throughout the presidential campaign, even though the claim is bogus. As Factcheck.org pointed out, “a worker can be a ‘taxpayer’ whether or not they owe any income tax.” Nearly every worker pays Social Security and Medicare taxes — “totaling 7.65 percent on every dollar of earnings” — and Americans pay federal taxes every time they buy gasoline or pay a phone bill, for example. Congressional Budget Office figures show that even the lowest-earning households pay about 4.3 percent of their income to federal taxes.

At the end of the CNN segment, Giuliani pushed for more bailout funds for investment banks. In other words, Giuliani is all for Wall Street welfare that fuels a skyrocketing cost of living, but virulently opposed to tax cuts for the poor that help fuel an economic recovery.

http://thinkprogress.org/2009/01/30/giuliani-wall-stree... /

I'm just sayin', isn't that what the stockholders would want? Unfettered markets don't work, and this regulation would put more money in the hands of the stockholders, which was the point of corporations, I thought.

They get a pay cut but make more on their stock dividends, so it all evens out?

Kick Ass!

However, I doubt it will go through.

Sen. McCaskill gets it right!

Source: KC Star

Sen. Claire McCaskill's office says she's offered a bill capping pay at any company accepting federal bailout dollars.

The cap? What the President makes: $400,000 a year. (Barack Obama gets expense money in addition to the regular salary.)

McCaskill's plan would include salary, bonuses, and stock options. We don't know if it would include deferred compensation or perks -- like, say, $1 million to redo an office.

Read more: http://primebuzz.kcstar.com/?q=node/16872#new

I hope they can get the money back.

because you know those slimy pigs at the troph will find them.

... I'm sure the Fat Cats have their personal accountants and lawyers scouring the statutes already.

sign it unless they took out caps on exec pay? They claimed they needed it to keep their best managers, (like this crap was good management). I say, "let them quit," if they are bummed about not getting bonuses. Where are they going to go? The managers quitting might be the best thing to happen: let newer talent take over and run things more judiciously.

executive pay was only limited for institutions that the government bailed out by buying their bad loans. Of course, once Paulson got the money, he decided not to buy the bad loans and just gave banks the bailout funds to do with as they wished. Since the funds weren't specifically being used to buy the bad loans as it was stated in the agreement, that was the loophole executives needed to avoid any caps on their compensation.

Executives Could Profit Off Bailout Through Loophole

Listen Now <3 min 34 sec> add to playlist

Day to Day, December 16, 2008 · When Congress approved the $700 billion bailout for struggling banks, they made sure to include caps on executive pay. But last-minute changes by the Bush administration have left a giant loophole in the regulations. Alex Cohen talks to Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley discusses how executives could make off with millions.




http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=98...

Is there any reason to pay $3 or $5 or $50 million a year? It is just a game of who's dick is bigger. take away the incentive for CEO's to screw their employees and the public with their out sized paychecks with far higher top marginal rate.

Seems to me that any company receiving tax payer's money to help bailout the company should have salaries that are comparable to those made by tax payer compensated public employees.

Take it or leave it. Where else can these CEOs go?

They don't have a lot of choices. LOL

Working is just a hobby for them.

Doesn't seem like there's going to be much of a demand for CEOs who expect multi-million dollar salaries and bonuses, especially for ones who have already run one company into the ground.

because it is a strong incentive to succeed... but bonuses, parachutes, etc., should be off the table until the taxpayers get the money back.

If they don't like it, nationalize their shit companies and put people in charge who care and will do the job for that same money - I'm guessing you'll see far better returns on investment.

it kills them, and I kind of hope it does. Fifty grand a year is PLENTY.

$50K is not enough motivation for a job as intense and as stressful as that one.

what it's like not to make enough money to feel secure.

teaching special needs kids in the New York school system. He was stabbed twice and came home every week with bruises all over his arms and legs. Are you telling me being a stock broker is more intense and stressful than that?

From where I'm sitting we need good teachers a hell of a lot more than we need good stock brokers. Why should they get paid eight times what my uncle did? And he lived near New York on $90,000 a year for him and his wife quite comfortably.

is how much of a single person's compensation is tax deductible by the company. Set that at $400k. Any amount above that is after taxes on the corporate bottom line.

Let's hope it gets lots of co-sponsors, and passes.

Personally, I'd rather have our money back, these assholes can go to hell. Since that won't happen, at least the "getting our money back" part, $200K should be the cap. Why? Because it would take at least TWO of these morons to make one Obama, and he only makes $400k. These banks should have died. Natural selection.

using the word "idiot."

right away.

There's a word missing:Greedy.Bunch of heartless bastards!

All of these banks AND the Federal Reserve need nationalizing (as Kucinich is pushing for now), and to start over with another batch of small community banks and credit unions, like the ones we still have which have been doing things right all along. And don't let them even cross state lines ever again.

She voted for the bailout.

Phase out at $50K

big wide world of pure capitalism, then the sky is theoretically the limit. But when they cry uncle, it's only logical that there's a price to be paid.

The rich and powerful want socialism for themselves - and that pure, rugged capitalism for the rest of us

Hmm?

is that if they are "too big to fail" they are guaranteed to get more government money. Everything we have given them so far has gone into mergers and executive compensation, while the rank and file have been let go, and their stockholders have been ruined. Fuck 'em!

They will work harder to make more and we will get money to burn !
Let them dork for us like we work for them.

loopholes that we mere mortals never even considered feasible.

taxes on the rich because "the rich don't pay taxes anyway". ?

WE gave it to them... now just who are the idiots?

Hahahahaha! That's the perfect answer!

Now that's what I'm talking about! Imo if the pukes fight us on this, they won't be able to be elected dog-catcher in my life time.

Why would anyone "need" to make more money than the President? Are their jobs more important? Does anyone need more than 400k to be content? ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!

finally decide they've had enough -- especially they are the ones handing out billions of tax dollars to these a-holes. What Wall Street has been doing is beyond ridiculous!! They should be forced to pay the bailout monies back --- with penalties.

If this kind of crap keeps up we can be the next Iceland, whose banks collapsed in the fall and their govt. collapsed financially this past week due to massive debts; along with revolts by their citizens. We are not immune to the same thing. And that is exactly, in my opinion, where we're heading if someone at the top doesn't start saying "Enough is enough!".

Since none of the current bunch will do it for just $400k, I think you're stuck with the likes of me. Let's see. I think I'll head up Citibank. I like the logo, and they have a nice new building near where I live.

Uh...can I hire a chef for the lunch room?

I imagine the reaction will be swift and unified.

Howzabout NOT limiting CEO pay?
(hear me out now...)

Just make it the law that you can't pay your LOWEST paid any less than 1/50th of the TOTAL compensation of the CEO (to account for all those "my 'salary' is $1 a year" types)
Go ahead.. Pay your CEO $250 million. That means the guy you got scrubbing toilets gets 5 mil per annum.

This would only work in curbing the megacorps.. If you are a small bidness you can't pay your guys $100/yr

Whaddiya think?

--MAB