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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Elroy who wrote (317412)	12/26/2006 12:00:03 PM
From: Road Walker	Respond to of 1573092

re: You haven't yet, perhaps because I am able to express your viewpoint based on what you've written, without making stuff up. LOL.

To: Elroy who wrote (317412)	12/26/2006 1:00:17 PM
From: Road Walker	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1573092

Wall Street's big holiday gifts hint at nation's wealth gap Tue Dec 26, 8:04 AM ET For workers lucky to get a turkey as a Christmas bonus, the year-end payouts to top Wall Street executives must seem unimaginable. Earlier this month, Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack took home $40 million, a record bonus for a single year's performance. Days later, his record was smashed by the $53.4 million payout to Goldman Sach's Lloyd Blankfein. If executive pay as a whole has reached insane levels, at major securities firms it is insanity on steroids. The payouts to Mack and Blankfein are part of $24 billion in bonuses New York's comptroller expects will be paid by securities firms this year, thanks to surging 2006 profits. Some might see it as Scrooge-like to begrudge big bonuses in such a bountiful year. But the whopping payouts underscore something of greater social importance: the nation's growing disparities in wealth. The top 10% of income earners in the USA own 70% of the wealth, according to a Federal Reserve study. And while hourly wages are forecast to increase about 3.5% this year, Wall Street bonuses are expected to jump 15% from last year. These trends are a recipe for resentment and class conflict. To be sure, senior Wall Street executives are highly skilled workers and deserve hefty pay. Yet the surge in profits on Wall Street is the result of global economic forces - rising markets and a wave of corporate mergers - that these fortunate executives did not create and can't claim credit for. If the rationale is their expertise, do they deserve to profit from events beyond their control any more than unskilled workers? And should they be able to do this at the expense of, and with little input from, shareholders in their companies? These payouts are also hard to justify on the basis of retaining top talent. At Goldman Sachs, they might actually be driving people away. After all, when you're fabulously wealthy, why stay? Blankfein's two immediate predecessors, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine, left and took the enormous pay cuts associated with public service At Mack's company, some of the biggest paychecks have been to get rid of people. His predecessor was paid $113 million to leave after fomenting a state of near insurrection in the ranks. Defenders of Wall Street's pay packages say they are actually quite reasonable in the context of the fortunes made by hedge fund managers, Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, entertainers and athletes. That argument illustrates the problem. Advancing technology and mass media have created an environment in which vast fortunes can be made in a virtual blink of an eye. So be it. That is to be expected, perhaps even encouraged, in the name of capitalism. But the Wall Streeters don't put their own capital at risk. They haven't devised hugely innovative products such as Google or YouTube. People don't buy tickets to see them perform. Yet they look to the people who do these things as benchmarks. For those on Wall Street who feel envious or left behind, we offer this advice: Go start your own company, or else take up acting. Copyright © 2006 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.

To: Elroy who wrote (317412)	12/31/2006 4:53:24 PM
From: tejek	Respond to of 1573092

No, it shows you to be a poor understander of other poster's English. Your inability to accurately express my views is your shortcoming, not mine. In response to the article about the CEO getting ~$180 million severance pay despite the fact that the company lost 40% of its market cap during his tenure, you wrote that I think that should be the natural state of things. That's not the article he was referencing when he made that quote. You need to go back and look more carefully.