The Real Victims
ABC News reports on the masters of the universe, not as rich as they used to be, still way richer than the people who didn’t destroy the economy:
“It’s going to be very hard psychologically for these people,” Frank said. “I talked to one guy who had to give up his private jet recently. And he said of all the trials in his life, giving that up was the hardest thing he’s ever done.” [...] The chairman of Lehman Brothers, Richard Fuld, still has his mansion in Greenwich, CT, his oceanfront estate on Jupiter Island in FL, and his Park Avenue co-op in Manhattan. Many at Lehman blame Fuld for dallying while his investment bank went bust, taking risks with other people’s money while he cleared over $40 million in salary and stock in the last year alone.
Of course it would hardly make a dent in the overall $700 billion cost of the bailout, but it seems to me that we should be seizing all the homes belonging to all the executives of companies in need of bailing out and selling them to raise some of the bailout funds. Maybe they could get real jobs and work for a living.
37 Responses to “The Real Victims”
Register
RSSLogin
Topic Cloud
ArchivesBlog RollAbout Matt YglesiasContact Me
Donate
September 21st, 2008 at 12:18 pm
Not gonna happen. The better choice is to buy equity in the troubled financial institutions, diluting current shareholders and providing upside to taxpayers, rather than just giving the companies free money.
September 21st, 2008 at 12:19 pm
Would you say they do more or less work than a professional blogger?
September 21st, 2008 at 12:28 pm
Please…the bush DOJ will probably hunt down dick fuld’s limo driver and take his house to offset the $700 billion bailout.
September 21st, 2008 at 12:30 pm
Let them spend a year working outside in 100 degree heat on physically demanding construction jobs. Or on farms.
Then let them go home and cook their own meals and wash their own dishes. Plain meals. Pinto beans, corn bread and a little slice of ham. Because meat is expensive to many people.
Then remind them they have to hold down a second job in the evening cleaning toilets at the local office building. Maybe then they will appreciate what it means when they piss away a $Trillion in wealth that people have slaved to accumulate.
I’m beginning to think Commies actually had a good idea with their “ReEducation Camps” for leaders who fuck up.
September 21st, 2008 at 12:33 pm
I would send the Neocons down to San Antonio –let them clean the bedpans of all the burn victims and those crippled by IEDs.
September 21st, 2008 at 12:36 pm
Re-education camps. I’d type them for organ matches and farm them out. Someone needs eyes? They lose them. Someone needs a heart and you match? Too bad for you.
September 21st, 2008 at 12:46 pm
Mr. Yglesias has a good idea– seize their houses. I like Don Williams’ idea too but it would never happen in America, unfortunately.
September 21st, 2008 at 12:55 pm
Any firm getting bailout money gets their executive salary capped at 2/3 of the median income. Make ‘em a constituency for decreasing inequality, not increasing it.
I’m half-tempted to say we should just handle this whole thing like Alaska does oil – everybody gets their own shares of this resource they suddenly own.
September 21st, 2008 at 12:57 pm
“I talked to one guy who had to give up his private jet recently. And he said of all the trials in his life, giving that up was the hardest thing he’s ever done.”
Oh the humanity! I’m sure this tale will evoke sympathy from some single mom who can’t afford albuterol (whose price recently tripled) for her asthmatic child.
This is a litmus test for Reid and Pelosi. If they cave on this the democrats can go to hell.
September 21st, 2008 at 12:57 pm
I say cap salaries at the government pay scale for the same job.
September 21st, 2008 at 1:33 pm
“Maybe they could get real jobs and work for a living.”
I say make them beg on the streets of Kolkata for a year. Or maybe pull a rickshaw. I think they might get an appreciation of how others live.
September 21st, 2008 at 1:58 pm
yikes! do you guys really believe these things?
I mean, they’re dickheads, obviously…but…
September 21st, 2008 at 2:06 pm
The taxpayers should be able to get their hands on some of that $40 million as well.
My prescription, at least for the next cycle.
September 21st, 2008 at 2:10 pm
“Maybe they could get real jobs and work for a living.”
Yes. Look, what these executives did was basically extortion on a massive scale. They ran their companies into the ground knowing full well that they would push the risk on us. They should go to jail for it. What has been offered above are merely more creative methods of punishment than jail. If someone broke into your house in stole $3,000 from you, you would certainly expect them to go to jail. Well, these executives are stealing $3,000 from every single one of us. It should be treated as the criminal act that it is.
September 21st, 2008 at 2:11 pm
Oops, Cut and paste problem. I have a sticky control key.
“yikes! do you guys really believe these things?”
Yes. Look, what these executives did was basically extortion on a massive scale. They ran their companies into the ground knowing full well that they would push the risk on us. They should go to jail for it. What has been offered above are merely more creative methods of punishment than jail. If someone broke into your house in stole $3,000 from you, you would certainly expect them to go to jail. Well, these executives are stealing $3,000 from every single one of us. It should be treated as the criminal act that it is.
September 21st, 2008 at 2:16 pm
Maybe, I was a tad over the top.
The closest thing I’ve heard of working in the legislature is to force all the CEO’s, CFO’s, and board members to take a credit counseling class. I don’t think that’s anywhere near punitive enough but something between there and harvesting their organs is absolutely crucial.
September 21st, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Re fostert’s comment “Well, these executives are stealing $3,000 from every single one of us ”
————
Well, more like $31,000 if you can afford a PC and an Internet connection. There’s about 50 Million poor households who don’t have anything to steal. By Einstein’s Laws re the Space Time Continuum, that Leaves the other 65 Million of us holding the bag of shit.
September 21st, 2008 at 2:33 pm
Re: Well, more like $31,000 if you can afford a PC and an Internet connection. There’s about 50 Million poor households who don’t have anything to steal. By Einstein’s Laws re the Space Time Continuum, that Leaves the other 65 Million of us holding the bag of shit.
Nope. The poor (along newborn infants etc.) just go down into negative numbers.
September 21st, 2008 at 3:17 pm
A great idea. It is not just the CEOs we should be going after. All the members of these boards and the managing directors of the investment banks who collected the fees on the sale of these MBS and CDS.
Also, hedge funds should not be excluded from regulation. Their leverage ratios will cause an equal amount of pain in the future. Remember LTCM and the geniuses that needed to be bailed out with support from the NY fed.
September 21st, 2008 at 3:42 pm
Yes. Look, what these executives did was basically extortion on a massive scale. They ran their companies into the ground knowing full well that they would push the risk on us.
I don’t believe Fuld intended to destroy his company. Or knew he was doing so.
September 21st, 2008 at 3:44 pm
Poor baby, had to give up his JET! How about giving up his home? Oh, I forgot. He has more than one.
September 21st, 2008 at 5:38 pm
“From time to time in this country, we find it necessary to shoot an admiral to encourage the others” Voltaire
Words to live by
September 21st, 2008 at 9:31 pm
Unsurprisingly enough, most of the prominent people who prattle about “individual responsibility” have most of their wealth in limited liability creatures.
September 22nd, 2008 at 1:48 am
These suggestions seems rash and too backward looking.
You have to tie it to forward looking things like stock options. I don’t know if any of them will have any options with any value, but you could certainly cancel those for all officers and directors of the participating companies to ensure that they do not profit off the gov’t intervention.
You could also use this opportunity to reform executive compensation by requiring future benefits like stock option grants to be based on medium and long-term company performance, rather than short-term, in order to prevent schemes to increase profits in the short term at the expense of the company in the long term.
September 22nd, 2008 at 9:13 am
I think they should be forced to pick lettuce for a season.
September 22nd, 2008 at 12:26 pm
I think they should be forced to pick lettuce for a season.
For a mere $50/hour? I’m sure they’d all take the easy way out on that one and just kill themselves.
March 1st, 2009 at 10:05 pm
cialis
Very interesting site. Hope it will always be alive!
March 2nd, 2009 at 8:01 am
levitraIncredible site!
March 13th, 2009 at 4:14 am
I want to say – thank you for this!
March 14th, 2009 at 8:34 am
I want to say – thank you for this!
xanax
March 17th, 2009 at 3:16 am
It is the coolest site,keep so!
tramadol
March 22nd, 2009 at 7:12 am
tramadol
Excellent site. It was pleasant to me.
March 22nd, 2009 at 11:12 am
buy viagra online
I want to say – thank you for this!
April 2nd, 2009 at 8:49 am
It is the coolest site,keep so!
buy cheap viagra
April 3rd, 2009 at 5:26 am
If you have to do it, you might as well do it right
cheap brand pfizer viagra
April 14th, 2009 at 10:44 am
Incredible site!
viagra