“I have no confidence that they intend or desire to change,” [Carl] Levin told me. “These bankers got away with murder, and it’s obscene that close to nothing is being asked of financial institutions. I get incensed at the thought that a bank that’s getting billions of dollars in taxpayer money is out there buying fancy new airplanes.”
New York Times, Jan. 28, 2009, Column by Maureen Dowd, Wall Street’s Socialist Jet-Setters
A couple months ago I wrote a Futures editorial that got a big response, largely because it took on the arrogance of companies and their corporate jets. At the time I was chiding the car makers, but apparently executive self entitlement has spiraled to the point that even when a company is taking public money, it’s willing to buy a corporate jet for $50 million and be shocked when the government, which loaned the company money, steps in and says no.
In Citigroup’s defense I know this thought process isn’t rampant in its rank and file. One of its executives told me once that while traveling with their children, he and his wife had to stay at a lesser star hotel because their hotel of choice was overbooked. His children were angry, and he and his wife were so appalled by their reaction, that for years afterward when they traveled they stayed at Motel 6’s until the kids quit complaining.
That’s what the government has to do with these Wall Street elite. Have them stay at a Motel 6, and hey, why not force them to travel by Greyhound bus too? They have computers and Blackberries and mobile phones they can use to work while they travel, and well, they can get to see the countryside they so helped destroy while they are at it.
In Maureen Dowd’s piece she also says the government should call Wall Street’s bluff on bonuses. When asked by a reporter to explain why he still pushed bonuses for a group that lost billions of dollars, former Merrill Lynch CEO John Thain replied that if you don’t pay, you’ll lose good people. Dowd’s response was, how good could they be? I agree. Obviously there are many good people on Wall Street who have treaded water in these trying times. But there are as many – and perhaps more – who are still demanding bonuses for losing money. Don’t pay them bonuses and let’s see what happens. Will the “smartest guys in the room” take their ball and go away? Let’s hope so.
The latest news hitting Wall Street was the brain trust at AIG that wants to give bonuses despite being on the public dole. This is the same group that kept up pheasant hunting in Great Britain and went spa-ing despite the company’s financial problems. And who would receive said bonuses? Well, the finanical products division responsible for blowing the hole in the AIG bubble to begin with. Now that’s brass.
