May 26, 2011
No human is worth the amount of remuneration these big reputation, but far from infallible or prescient, executives have received, and keep demanding. The salaries are outrageous, and the bonuses are obscene--while accountability has been glaringly absent. Even after their disastrous policies were revealed as heavily contributing factors in dreadful losses to millions of people and cascading failures of businesses and markets, was there disgorgement? Not that I have heard of. Shouldn't there be? Weren't the Rigas father and son of Adelphia infamy ordered to disgorge their ill-gotten gains? (Not that they have. . .)
It is simply not credible that not paying such exorbitant salaries and bonuses would leave the financial firms and Wall Street unable to attract and keep necessary talent. With adequate support staff, the top executives on Wall Street do not have more responsibility and more daunting managerial challenges to handle than, say, the President of the United States. Nor should their pay be orders of magnitude greater.
My community and many friends have suffered and continue to suffer the effects of recession, some of those effects permanent even as recovery progresses. A plant closed and torn down is gone; those jobs are gone forever. People are dying in poverty and near poverty because of Wall Street greed and top level fecklessness. Do not allow such behavior to be not only rewarded but given the stamp of approval that should come only for excellent, wise and successful performance.
Thank you.
Martha Knight
Port Allegany, PA