5 Salaries of Auto Industry CEOs

The whole thing seems like craziness, straight up. I could not believe what I was hearing being debated about the UAW "average hourly salaries" vs. those of the Japanese car manufacturers operating here. It just seems very obvious to me that all those who have been mis-managing these companies into dire straights should not have those golden parachutes and high salaries with bonuses. I find the facts you quoted an underscore to the problem. I'm sure that the new CEO of Florida Lighting will justify the bonus based upon the fact that without those 100 employees, there is no repeating labor cost for them. They just don't get it. Public corporations should also bear a responsibility to the people of the communities from which they prosper. And keeping folks employed should be part of their responsibilities. I'm not talking about relieving the place of dead wood, I talk of cutting just for the sake of having higher profits. If one really takes the time to think about it, corporate america has switched services over into sophisticated answering systems and robotics which usually account for one large lump sum investment and a maintenence investment on an annual basis. They system more than pays for itself in the first year, in the case of keeping customers on the phone without single human contact. Some companies will lose business by this total lack of regard to their consumer base, but municipal business and utilities, monopolies or near monopolies, just don't care. The attitude is, where else you gonna go - gotcha! These cuts in labor do save companies in their labor expense. Some of that should be given to better training of the remaining labor force. You create a better employee, it benefits the company dynamically.

I don't know what else to say about the bailout except that for a long time now, I believe our own representatives - the senators and congresspersons whom we elected, are no longer representing the people. Some of them to the disdaining tune of thinking we cannot possibly know enough to give credence to our whims. I'm so tired of that. When representatives stop representing the people, then they are pandering with other powers. It's not just wrong, it is a disregard to the service for which they were employed. They have failed in their primary responsibility, and as such, it should be much easier than it is to hold them responsible for their actions or inactions. They already think they do such good work for such a demanding position that they regularly vote themselves wonderful raises that far exceed the standard of living and inflation increases since their last raises. And the boss - "we the people" cannot even put them on notice.

I'm not one for undermining our government - I just think that something went wrong with our checks and balances system and it has stopped working the way it was intended to work. We need to fix that first. But how?

Lin

Lin Cava of 2:25PM December 06, 2008