Goldman Sachs Board Member Compares Bankers To Pro Athletes, Movie Stars (VIDEO)

[highplainsdem]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/06/bill-george-goldman-sachs_n_412738.html

Goldman Sachs board member and Harvard professor Bill George defended the firm's massive bonuses and compared employees' compensation to that of professional athletes and movie stars during a recent interview.

In an interview posted Dec. 23, 2009, George told the ideas web site Big Think "I think that one feels like the shareholder value is made up in people and you need the people there to do the job and if you don't pay them for their performance you'll lose them and it's much like professional athletes and movie stars I think."

He went on to admit that he couldn't justify the size of a banker's salary compared to that of a school teacher's, but he said that the same could be said about the salary of a professional athlete.

According to The New York Times, Goldman Sachs has set aside at least $16.7 billion for employee compensation in 2009, or an average of about $700,000. Goldman's bonuses are on track to break the record they set in 2007. The firm has decided their top 30 executives will receive bonuses in long-term stock, rather than cash.

[midnight]

1. If mothers, or nurses or other professions lagging in the star treatment area

had agents working for them they would get paid better too.

[slipslidingaway]

2. knr nt

[Vinnie From Indy]

3. Bill George is an arrogant piece of crap

One of the biggest lies told about Goldman's bonuses is that if they do not pay these bonuses that they will lose very talented people to other firms. My question is where in the hell will these "rock stars" go if they leave? It seems with consolidation on Wall Street that there are not many options to earn that kind of money somewhere else.

The exceptionalism and the bizarre idea that these people are "entitled" is off the charts. If we had an even partially functioning government, we would be taxing the living shit out of these bonuses as they are doing in England.

[prole_for_peace]

4. Well Mr George, I am disgusted by the pay movie stars and athletes receive

I think it is bullshit and more money should be paid to teachers and nurses than people who "entertain" us.

And is he saying that bankers are entertainers and should be paid as such?

[LiberalFighter]

5. So George is saying that the function of bankers is to entertain people?

[Cassandra]

6. I'm sooooo not entertained.