This Christmas has really driven home the gap between the haves and the have-nots. In years past I could just ignore all those insane gift commercials. Now I'm noticing that even Menards is in on the creepy act - Menards is the midwest equivalent of Lowes and Home Depot, but with an even stronger working class feel. Last night they were advertising $400 power tools and $700 tool chests as great Christmas gifts!I'm also thinking about the lessons inherent in A Christmas Carol by Dickens. How wonderfully sweet of the big 3 automaker CEO's to take a $1 a year salary as part of a bail out. This seems like a sacrifice until you learn that they make upwards of $22 million a year!
Why aren't they being fired??!! For $22 million a year I'd expect just a wee bit of success, wouldn't you? And honestly, how much harder do they work to earn those millions every year?
The President of the academically elite liberal arts college where I work makes just over $500G's a year. That was recently published in the Minneapolis Star Tribune so I'm not telling tales out of school. This institution has never had lay offs. Their endowment is healthy. Their students are successful. The institution grows every year. This man flys all over the country and the world, commercial I might add, to further the purposes of the college. He works just as many long hard hours as a major CEO.
The President of the University of Minnesota makes just over $700G's. That's a Big Ten teaching, medical, and R&D facility with over 40,572 undergraduate students, 25,527 graduate, professional, and other students, 4,088 full-time faculty, and $619.2 million in sponsored research awards. He governs not only the large metro Twin Cities campus but four coordinate campuses in outstate.
I say if a large corporation fails, and is looking for a taxpayer hand out, you fire the whole lot and replace them with hard working Americans willing to accept a more reasonable salary. I'm sick and tired of the rich Ebenezer Scrooge's hoarding everything.
Addendum - little sister is right. Hear what Michael Moore has to say. Exactly!
15 comments:
Did you happen to catch Michael Moore on Countdown with Keith last evening? Man, he nailed it with the Big 3!
Life in the bubble (you know the big ass bubble you can be in if you are among the super rich) determines that you never watch or read A Christmas Carol.
Deep sigh.
I just wrote about you, I hope its ok. If it is not you can tell me and I will cease and desist. I just wish I were a bubble free rich person so that we could all be a lot freer and happier.
Amen. Although, I have met Bob Bruininks (see photo in facebook) and I am CONVINCED that he is actually a robot; $700gs is a lot to keep a robot working. Robots taking our major public research university president jobs, what's next!??!?
(Just kidding Presidents Bruininks, please don't fire me!)
I can just imagine that those U President's also GIVE a higher percentage of their salary to charity/church/the community good.
Little Sister - I didn't. Alas, no cable!
Fran - Thank you for your kind word!
Missy - even a robot is doing a better job that the CEO's of the big 3
Mommy - they do.
MnMom-you can catch it on you tube.
If the CEO's went on vacation for a month, the car companies wouldn't miss them. But send the workers, or even the bathroom cleaners, out for a week, well, there'd be a difference, maybe a stink.
Does anyone who makes $22million a year have a clue how average people live? Sure they can afford a $1 salary(taken from the gesture Lee Iococa gave during the long ago Chrysler bail out)they have money in the bank and paid for homes.
I just reel daily at these big failing companies and their over paid CEO's.............um,don't we think there is a problem somewhere folks!
They'll gladly take a $1 salary, but did they also offer to give up bonuses too? I'd bet not, because I'm sure those huge bonuses they give themselves aren't considered part of their salary.
Watching the big CEO's in front of the Congressional committee today (for hours), I was still pissed. Basically, the point from the committee seems to be there will NOT be enough votes to bail them out. I say file bankruptcy like the rest of the damn country. If we end up with only one automobile manufacturer - fine. As times pick up, more will get into the competitive market. How can we compete, when South Korea impolrts 20 times the amount of cars we are allowed to export. Fukkers all need to get real. Dressing down, by arriving in cars this time is NOT enough for me.
You make a great comparison between the successes of the schools and the failures of the auto companies.
Funny how people are all for "free markets" as long as they have the ability to control things and rig the game in their favor.
But they have ironclad contracts so it doesn't matter if they do a good job or not, does it?
I'm rambling.
Isn't the UMinn guy a government employee? It's ridiculous for taxpayers (including poor people) to be forced to give money to vastly overpaid government employees.
That's more than a million every 2 years.
Imagine if you paid one of those college bosses $130,000 a year (which is very comfortable and elite) and used the $570,000 a year saved to give scholarships to poor students.
I saw Moore on Larry King. He made a lot of good points. But he was wrong when he mentioned that the UAW has "given back" anything. $70+ an hour jobs that are way above the market rate is not "giving back" a thing.
They are overpaid at from the bottom to the top at the Big 3.
"How can we compete, when South Korea imports 20 times the amount of cars we are allowed to export"
Perhaps by making better cars? Hyundai is now edging past the US carmakers in the quality area. Tariffs and import quotas are so NOT the way to go.
I agree the CEO's should go but you forget they hold a good part of the economy hostage. They point out that if we don't give them the money all kinds of little businesses will go down and lots of little people will be out of work.
What we need are some intelligent rich people to buy up the stock in these companies which is at an all time low. Then throw out the Boards.
Didn't they read or watch A Christmas Carol?
___________________
Julie
Lock in your price today for Your favorite
channels - and keep it there until 2010!
Post a Comment