CEO salaries, corporate power and employees

[caonima]

Player: there are mysterious accounting tricks that I don't know but that are definitely helping CEOs avoid paying a living wage

Also, ghosts

[Symmetry]

accounting "tricks (moving debt from one entity to another without really paying it off, for example).

What do you mean by this example? Are you referring to the things that Enron did, which are now completely illegal and for which top executives are now held personally liable, due to the Sarbanes-Oxley act?

I think you're going to have to explain your interpretation and argument on this one Timminz.

My interpretation is that Player doesn't fully understand these supposed "accounting tricks" and the laws regarding them, but I want to give her the chance to clarify her example, rather than just assuming.

Enron were using methods of hiding debt in subsidiary companies, thus inflating the company's perceived value (which is the practice I assume Player was referring to). Shortly following Enron's collapse (as well as a few other huge accounting scandals, like Worldcom), the US passed the Sarbanes-Oxley act which, among other things, requires full consolidation of subsidiary companies (to prevent exactly what Enron had done) and requires that the top executives of public companies sign off personally on the financial statements, meaning they are now personally liable for any fraudulent financial statements, thus removing their ability to hide behind a limited liability corporation when the shit hits the fan.

LOL.. NO ONE fully understands all the accounting tricks. Experts understand some.. and create different games continually.

What I was referring to had nothing to do with Enron. Companies can shift when and where they take profits for tax and other reasons. Greekdog actually gave a decent example some time ago in explaining how international companies pay taxes. He argued it was perfectly reasonable and sensible. A lot of us disagreed.

More directly, there is the whole bit of banks taking bad debt, piling it together into a new named product that suddenly gets great ratings-- mostly because it was not known before.

The point is that you can focus on whatever details.. and they will change almost as soon as they are figured out, folks write new laws, etc, etc. OR you can focus on the bottom line that our system is very unnecessarily complicated and obtuse, because so many people make tons of money in that system.

It even works for a while... but the ultimate truth is that when people are not paid well, they cannot spend well, and that means fewer profits for everyone.

Aye, one of the interesting things I read about the Enron case (and I appreciate that this is Timminz' example), was that it was so difficult to pin down, even for the Enron executives. What was presented to the court was (if I remember correctly) a summary of a summary of a summary of what Enron was doing, and that still ran to thousands of pages.

[Timminz]

Never in my life before this have I seen, "LOL I have no idea what I'm talking about", act as an effective argument. Somehow, it works here though.


I'm done. Player wins.

[BigBallinStalin]

Never in my life before this have I seen, "LOL I have no idea what I'm talking about", act as an effective argument. Somehow, it works here though.


I'm done. Player wins.

You gotta go one question at a time over several weeks. It's slow, but eventually you can stump her.

[Symmetry]

Never in my life before this have I seen, "LOL I have no idea what I'm talking about", act as an effective argument. Somehow, it works here though.


I'm done. Player wins.

You gotta go one question at a time over several weeks. It's slow, but eventually you can stump her.

Or you can argue over time and get a thread calling for your death, eh, BBS? Ah, wait, that ain't a Player tactic. Who was it who pulled that one?

[BigBallinStalin]

Never in my life before this have I seen, "LOL I have no idea what I'm talking about", act as an effective argument. Somehow, it works here though.


I'm done. Player wins.

You gotta go one question at a time over several weeks. It's slow, but eventually you can stump her.

Or you can argue over time and get a thread calling for your death, eh, BBS?

It's not my fault if the public chooses cake. You'll have to file a complaint against the ConquerClubbers who preferred the greater good.

[Symmetry]

Never in my life before this have I seen, "LOL I have no idea what I'm talking about", act as an effective argument. Somehow, it works here though.


I'm done. Player wins.

You gotta go one question at a time over several weeks. It's slow, but eventually you can stump her.

Or you can argue over time and get a thread calling for your death, eh, BBS? Ah, wait, that ain't a Player tactic. Who was it who pulled that one?

It's not my fault if the public chooses cake. You'll have to file a complaint against the ConquerClubbers who preferred the greater good.

Even for a pretend economist, you show poor taste.

[stahrgazer]

I think you're confusing corporate CEOs with financial service providers. They aren't the same thing.

1) Wrong, many financial service providers are companies that have corporate CEOs.
2) Wrong, I said quite clearly, many non-financial-service companies invested, via wall street, in those questionable CDOs and participated in the buying/selling/repackaging of them.
3) Wrong, as I've mentioned before, many CEOs of one company are on the boards of directors of other companies, including financial service provider companies.
4) Wrong. It's just another example of "money-power used unethically to the detriment of the country." As I'd said.

[BigBallinStalin]

Never in my life before this have I seen, "LOL I have no idea what I'm talking about", act as an effective argument. Somehow, it works here though.


I'm done. Player wins.

You gotta go one question at a time over several weeks. It's slow, but eventually you can stump her.

Or you can argue over time and get a thread calling for your death, eh, BBS? Ah, wait, that ain't a Player tactic. Who was it who pulled that one?

It's not my fault if the public chooses cake. You'll have to file a complaint against the ConquerClubbers who preferred the greater good.

Even for a pretend economist, you show poor taste.

I can't help it if I enjoy the company of women, my friend. Tastes are subjective!

[thegreekdog]

I think you're confusing corporate CEOs with financial service providers. They aren't the same thing.

1) Wrong, many financial service providers are companies that have corporate CEOs.
2) Wrong, I said quite clearly, many non-financial-service companies invested, via wall street, in those questionable CDOs and participated in the buying/selling/repackaging of them.
3) Wrong, as I've mentioned before, many CEOs of one company are on the boards of directors of other companies, including financial service provider companies.
4) Wrong. It's just another example of "money-power used unethically to the detriment of the country." As I'd said.

Answer my other questions in the other thread. Until you do that...

There is a distinct and marked difference between the CEO of General Electric and the chairman of Goldman Sachs. Your numbers (2) through (4) demonstrate how there are marked differences. For example, your (4) above states that "it's just another example" which demonstrates that the situations are different although your interpretation of the ultimate goals may be the same.

[Symmetry]

Answer my other questions in the other thread. Until you do that...

Ah the quintessential TGD argument.

[thegreekdog]

Answer my other questions in the other thread. Until you do that...

Ah the quintessential TGD argument.

Ah the quintessential Symmetry response.

[Symmetry]

Answer my other questions in the other thread. Until you do that...

Ah the quintessential TGD argument.

Ah the quintessential Symmetry response.

As the French say- touch.

[PLAYER57832]

Never in my life before this have I seen, "LOL I have no idea what I'm talking about", act as an effective argument. Somehow, it works here though.


I'm done. Player wins.

I see, you pick a 30 year old example, an example that people are still tangling out, and use it to dispute my claim that firms are using multiple techniques, inventing methods to avoid honest profit and loss reports....

And then go off as if you have actually made a statement?

I gave you a pretty good and well understood example, by-teh-way... the much more recent mortgage crisis, which was very much created by banks doing what can very loosely be called "accouting tricks", but are more often thought of by average people ast just plain fraud and cheating. Trouble is, none of those frauds and cheats, not a single one has been indicted, never mind convicted. Most walked off with hefty bonuses.

And none of that explains what is wrong with someone working hard 40 plus hours a day at a job someone apparently needs to have done, expecting to be able to just live without government assistance in return for that labor.

OR why such a thought generates such derision from so many people who seem to think they ought to have to pay fewer taxes, should not have to support worthless non-working people.


Yeah, its find to talk about companies being held accountable in a purely esoteric sense.... but apparently, just not when it comes to real details. THAT kind of responsibility is only for poor people who are too stupid to make reasonable choices for themselves.

[stahrgazer]

Answer my other questions in the other thread. Until you do that...

There is a distinct and marked difference between the CEO of General Electric and the chairman of Goldman Sachs. Your numbers (2) through (4) demonstrate how there are marked differences. For example, your (4) above states that "it's just another example" which demonstrates that the situations are different although your interpretation of the ultimate goals may be the same.

Whether I read through the entire thread to answer stuff I've probably already answered, but you're too blind to see; or whether I don't...

"Just another example," implies similarity, not differences.

There's not much difference between the CEO of GE and the chairman of GS. GE is undermining small businesses by becoming a multiglomerate and taking alot of its manufacturing OUTSIDE the United States, which small businesses cannot compete with. GE became able to do this primarily because of taxpayers and government-awarded contracts and in return, is making its CEO and its stockholders rich while forgetting how it got there, just as the chairman of GS made its CEO and its stockholders rich while forgetting how it got there. In both examples, the taxpayers were left holding the bag, and in both examples, the companies are f*g the American businesses and workers.

It's like this, dearie: Blue and red may be different along the light spectrum, but they both fit somewhere on that spectrum; just as GS and GE may produce different products, but they both conduct practices that undermine rather than support what made them great, and what made this country great.