bailout dead

I suppose we could all go back to a 19th-century level of technology.

When are you planting your field, Cyclo? Have you bought your mules yet?

There hasn't yet been an argument invented, that one couldn't Appeal to Extremes, apparently.

Cycloptichorn wrote:

There hasn't yet been an argument invented, that one couldn't Appeal to Extremes, apparently.

What could be more extreme than the silliness you're forwarding? Your supposed concerns over "resources" is the thinnest, most obvious excuse, for class warfare I've seen yet.

If you argue that someone would not continue to work hard if the state takes part of their income away from him, that's an argument that's fundamentally the same as for high taxes, and invalid for the same reasons.

When you argue that the state does not have the "right to limit the success of others", and has no business "deciding what other people are worth" or determining that "Michael Jordan is not worth his salary", those are broader arguments that, if they were valid, would apply against the government increasing high top tax rates as well.

Hence using the historical examples of high tax rates as illustration how it doesnt work that way.

You keep switching back and forth from insisting I am transgressing the subject when I mention taxation as alternate example, to using very broad, value-laden arguments yourself about how, basically, the government has no business to intervene in the supply/demand market mechanism of establishing someone's financial worth.

Moreover, you have injected value-laden concepts like whether someone is worth his salary, whether someone deserves his income. The reasoning basically being that, if the current market pricing for someone's job is x, then x is what he deserves, and capping or overly taxing that is basically taking away from what he's worth.

The ceilings we are talking about are still so high, that the worker can achieve a level of sloth and luxury afterwards not known by 99% of our population.

It isn't as if we are limiting people to some poorhouse.

I think it's just the idea of limitation that sticks in your craw; but that's a psychological problem, not a societal problem. I do not agree that all those who seek unlimited ambition will go elsewhere. I think that this is a threat used by the rich to cow the poor into keeping their taxes down, and nothing more

Really? We're trying to avoid these businesses going bankrupt? I thought the whole point was to get the credit moving again so that loans could be made, etc.

It seems to me that this can be accomplished even if the companies go into bankruptcy;

and if they are going to be begging for public money, their boards SHOULD be replaced, all of them.

Though you like to assign them no blame, they are to blame.

They failed their investors and ought to go, and if they are to take public money, they need to go.

I made a little mention earlier - about letting shareholders vote on executive pay. Would you be for or against such a policy?

This would truly remove the onus of paying executives exorbitant amounts, from investors who don't want to....

It depends on the specifics. To some degree they already can, but I see potential problems with it and would need to see your specifics. For example, if the shareholders vote that the guy gets X for X years and then change their minds do they get to just rip up his contract? And are you mandating that all companies allow this?

Those specifics are important, along with specifics like whether it applies to publicly traded companies alone or private ones as well.

Without knowing the specifics, it sounds like it could be helpful in some ways and unhelpful in others.

Quote:

This would truly remove the onus of paying executives exorbitant amounts, from investors who don't want to....

Well, how would it work?

Make up your mind Cyclo. Are you talking about taxes or are you talking about capping compensation?

You don't get to use arguments for one against arguments for the other. They are not fundamentally the same thing.

OCCOM BILL wrote:

Cycloptichorn wrote:

There hasn't yet been an argument invented, that one couldn't Appeal to Extremes, apparently.

What could be more extreme than the silliness you're forwarding? Your supposed concerns over "resources" is the thinnest, most obvious excuse, for class warfare I've seen yet.

Your opinion of my argument aside, DD was still Appealing to Extremes, which is a logical fallacy.

I lump you into the group of 'unbridled ambitioners;' that is to say, those who are more angry at the idea of limits than they are at what the actual limits would entail upon people's lives. It isn't as if limiting executive compensation will prevent any of these people from being rich...

I'm angry at nothing... and at 40 years old I don't think the ideals I'm arguing will ever apply to me personally... so I have no reason to anger. I simply don't think you've done a good job of weighing the Pro's and Con's. Not that Robert hasn't done an excellent job... because he has... so I saw little profit in adding, "Yeah!"

Here's a hypothetical example. We won't even bother with what's fair; let's just look at effect. Someone mentioned as an example CEO’s make an average of 300 times more than their workers... as if this arbitrary fact was bad. Let's say that's 9 million dollars a year and that he employs 1000 people, for easy math, lets say at 30K per year. Now let's cap the CEO at 100 times salary. His 1000 employees would all get about a $5,500 bump in salary... in exchange for crippling the entrepreneur’s ability to expand his business. This could very well be crippling enough to prevent him from creating another 1,000 jobs at $30,000. The net result in this model is 1000 less jobs pumping $30 million more dollars into the economy... just because people didn’t like the CEO keeping the extra 6 he earned. In this hypothetical: People who didn't earn the wealth, who don’t have the skills to do so, chose to take control of it at the point of a gun. But did they really do themselves any favors? I think not.

If you succeeded in capping all the country's brightest, most ambitious entrepreneurs; ultimately you would be doing a grave disservice to the entire country (even if they didn’t simply leave, which many would.) You can take their money with your guns... but you could never harness their creativity nor their productivity, so it is a very bad idea. This has been proven over and over throughout history.

U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio (OR-04), an outspoken critic of the Bush/Paulson bailout, along with Rep. Kaptur (OH-09), Rep. Scott (VA-03), Rep. Cummings (MD-07), Rep. Doggett (TX-25), Rep. Holt (NJ-12), Rep. Edwards (MD-04) and Rep. Hirono (HI-02), will introduce legislation today to address the failures in the financial markets. DeFazio believes that the Paulson/Bush proposal is based on a flawed premise: if the American taxpayers spend $700 billion to buy Wall Street's toxic assets - a plan pundits are calling "trash for cash" - it will create liquidity in our financial markets and will somehow trickle-down to Main Street.
DeFazio's plan is not in any way based on the Paulson/Bush plan. Instead of throwing taxpayer dollars at the program and crossing our fingers that the plan work, the measure will direct the Administration to take five simple steps, suggested by noted economist and former head of the FDIC, William Isaac, to re-regulate the markets and move America towards a healthy financial future.
The legislation will be available at the press conference.

Who: Rep. DeFazio, Rep. Kaptur (OH-09), Rep. Scott (VA-03), Rep. Cummings (MD-07), Rep. Doggett (TX-25), Rep. Holt (NJ-12), Rep. Edwards (MD-04) and Rep. Hirono (HI-02)
What: Press Conference to introduce legislation to fix financial markets
Where: House Radio and TV Gallery
When: 3 pm TODAY

Well, let's assume that the shareholders for any given company are, to begin, only allowed to vote on levels of compensation at given times; that is to say, once a year or so.

It's fair to say that compensation should be initiated at the time of hiring, and b/c this will not always match up with the voting periods, it is probably better for the shareholders to set guidelines for the company based on positions rather than address each individual salary. That way staffing changes can be made on the fly.

As for the contractual issues, I have no problem letting the shareholders decide for themselves which is best; having inviolate contracts with golden parachutes, having variable ones with performance-based incentives, or having no real contract whatsoever.

I'm sure the argument could be made that this is 'unhelpful' in certain ways, but you can make an argument for any position...

When it comes to a public bailout of these companies, however, their old contracts should be invalidated as a condition of accepting the bailout. If this means the company's leadership will choose to fail instead, so be it. It is not our job to bend over backwards to save these companies or the massive salaries of those at the top who, at the end of the day, are responsible for the losses to their shareholders as well as the losses the public will feel over this bailout.

I think most Americans would agree with me on this. If the companies fail, we will survive. We have survived much worse, and it's folly to claim that we will not survive this as well.

Let's make them the same. Everything earned over a certain amount could be taxed 100%. Make that amount proportional to the lowest paid employee in your company.

Of course, this is just my inner socialist talking....

Um, why don't you do the much easier option of capping the CEO at 3 million, instead of just giving everyone a raise?

Quote:

I'm angry at nothing... and at 40 years old I don't think the ideals I'm arguing will ever apply to me personally... so I have no reason to anger. I simply don't think you've done a good job of weighing the Pro's and Con's. Not that Robert hasn't done an excellent job... because he has... so I saw little profit in adding, "Yeah!"

Here's a hypothetical example. We won't even bother with what's fair; let's just look at effect. Someone mentioned as an example CEO’s make an average of 300 times more than their workers... as if this arbitrary fact was bad. Let's say that's 9 million dollars a year and that he employs 1000 people, for easy math, lets say at 30K per year. Now let's cap the CEO at 100 times salary. His 1000 employees would all get about a $5,500 bump in salary... in exchange for crippling the entrepreneur’s ability to expand his business. This could very well be crippling enough to prevent him from creating another 1,000 jobs at $30,000. The net result in this model is 1000 less jobs pumping $30 million more dollars into the economy... just because people didn’t like the CEO keeping the extra 6 he earned. In this hypothetical: People who didn't earn the wealth, who don’t have the skills to do so, chose to take control of it at the point of a gun. But did they really do themselves any favors? I think not.

Um, why don't you do the much easier option of capping the CEO at 3 million, instead of just giving everyone a raise? That would give the business overall MORE money to spend on creating new jobs. All it would limit is the upper end of a few rich executive's ambition. Big whoop.

If you succeeded in capping all the country's brightest, most ambitious entrepreneurs; ultimately you would be doing a grave disservice to the entire country (even if they didn’t simply leave, which many would.)

``The American people are angry about executive compensation and rightfully so,'' Paulson, a former chief executive officer of Goldman Sachs Group Inc., told the House panel today, departing from his prepared remarks. ``We must find a way to address this in the legislation, but without undermining the effectiveness of this program.''

I think the problem here is you have too little respect for the entrepreneur’s who earn the money. You don’t realize they really are that much better at what they do than you would be. You seem to think you can pass half-baked ideas off the top of your head and match the performance of a man or woman the market values in 7 figure increments. You can't. And that's why Nationalization never works. People work to better their own lot in life, first and foremost. Regardless of what nonsensical rules bureaucracies saddle them with; this fundamental truth remains.

DrewDad wrote:

I suppose we could all go back to a 19th-century level of technology.

When are you planting your field, Cyclo? Have you bought your mules yet?

There hasn't yet been an argument invented, that one couldn't Appeal to Extremes, apparently.

Cycloptichorn

You are correct, I do have little respect for those at the top of these corporations. They are just like any other employee. You say that they 'earn the money.' Poppycock. The hard work of EVERYONE in the company earns the money. CEOs and other executives come and go just like all other employees. The business is bigger then they are. Many of them have no special ability whatsoever and got their jobs out of connections; many make stupid decisions that negatively impact thousands, yet walk away with millions. Capping their pay at a multiple of their employees gives recognition to EVERYONE'S efforts in making the company succeed.

Nimh is talking about limiting anyone's compensation.