Posted on 01/03/2007 6:20:39 PM PST by traumer
because no one has ever tried to sell me half-wolf puppies out of a cardboard box in the parking lot at Target.
Now THAT's FUNNY!!!
Owl_Eagle
If what I just wrote made you sad or angry,
it was probably just a joke.
"Executive compensation is negotiated with the help of attorneys."
Indeed it is, and employees have the right to use an attorney when negotiating compensation also.
"What impact do you think it has on the average employee to watch a CEO preside over a 40% decline in the value of his company..."
CEO compensation is the business of the owners of the company, i.e., the shareholders, not the employees. Employees, if they wish to have some say in CEO compensation, may buy stock like any other individual. Unprofitable CEOs will soon find themselves unemployed, and unemployable.
Corporations are not job banks or welfare offices. They are not social engineering experimentation arenas designed to ensure "fairness" for everyone. Corporations exist to make a profit.
One of the great things about this country is that where you end up on the ladder need not depend on where you started. Any employee may gain the skills and education to potentially make himself CEO, if he wishes. There is no law saying one must be a wage earner for life. Many CEOs come from quite humble backgrounds, and I for one, do not begrudge them their success. As for the Ken Lays of the world, I believe they should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. But the vast majority of CEOs are not Ken Lay. The vast majority got where they are by out-learning, out-thinking and out-working everyone else around them.
As for the "feelings" of any particular employee, one might just as legitimately ask how employees "feel" when they lose their jobs because the union demanded wages and benefits the company couldn't afford to pay over the long term.
Unless I own stock in the company, the severance package of the CEO doesn't concern me any more than the hourly wage of the burger flipper. If I have partial ownership of either company, i.e., if I own stock, then I have a say.
If I have no stock in the company, and therefore no stake in the deal, preoccupation with the terms of someone else's severance package smacks of nothing more than plain old-fashioned jealousy.
I'm not preoccupied -- I'm amused. It makes me laugh to watch the TANSTAAFL, "everybody should be paid what they deserve" free market True Believers try to defend these slimeball con artists as they eat one Free Lunch after another at shareholder and employee expense.
As for jealousy: I have my own business and couldn't care less what anybody else makes. My family and I live in the magic land of Enough and are happy to do so.
"Yeah, lawyers and multimillion court cases."
Unions employ armies of lawyers and are not at all adverse to running to the courts at the drop of a hat. Litigation and the threat of litigation is one of the biggest hammers they employ, used much more often than strikes.
True story. No BS.
As for jealousy: I have my own business and couldn't care less..."
And yet, you've brought up CEO compensation in two posts I've seen so far.
Is your business unionized?
Whoops! Posted too soon.
I meant to add...if your business is not unionized, is it publicly-traded? Can I buy stock and then dictate your compensation? Or even, as some here would have it, get a job working for you, band with my fellow employees, and then dictate our salaries and benefits based on what we think we're worth, and demand you pay it whether your company can support that or not?
True story. No BS.
That's what makes it so damn funny. The true ones are the best kind.
Owl_Eagle
If what I just wrote made you sad or angry,
it was probably just a joke.
If someone is needed to do something during their 15 minute break at our store they get to start the entire break over again.
If they only had 1-2 minutes left they still get 15 minutes more.
Note; While I agree with A. Pole on many issues, I'm not a big fan of unions as they currently exist. I support something more along the lines of medieval guilds. But bringng back the guilds would require the restructuring of our entire society, which won't happen until the whole unsustainable house of cards comes crashing down of its own accord. Until that happens, the best workers can hope for is to find work at businesses owned by geerous people like our folks and avoid working for slimeball con artists.
Non ligabis os bovis terentis in area fruges tuas ("Do not bind the mouths of the kine that tread the corn") Deuteronomy 25:4
Fair enough... difference noted. But she could easily 'document' anything on her own. As the complainant isn't she required to support her claim beyond a reasonable doubt? She could write anything she wanted somewhere and claim its 'documentation', but that simply creates a he said she said scenario. I would think that something more substantial would be needed. Perhaps Wal Mart security video that shows her actually working at a time when she was clearly off the clock.
We agree more than we differ, then, since you know there are human beings on both sides. Too many on this forum act like it's the eeeeevil corporations vs. the poor, innocent, put-upon wage slaves. Such simplistic, linear thinking isn't worthy of conservatives.
My extended family also owned a business when I was growing up in a non-right-to work-state. Like you, everyone lived frugally and reinvested every spare penny into building the business. Unfortunately, union agitators came in and demanded more pay and benefits than the business could support. The family tried to pay the wages for awhile, but eventually they were forced to liquidate the labor-intensive part of the business rather than go under. It was a terrible, terrible time for everyone, for the owners who who had acted in good faith at all times, were scrupulously honest, and paid good wages and benefits, and for the employees, who lost their jobs when the company went out of business. The union thugs merely went away to harass others.
I have little sympathy for unions. They once served a purpose, but no more. Now they're merely vehicles for socialism, for elevating the least common denominator at the expense of excellence. Employers will pay market wages and offer good benefits to skilled employees who contribute to the bottom line.
I can't speak to the facts of this case, but I can tell you what happened to me back in the early 80s when I worked at a Monkey Wards around Christmas one year. Due to increased help that was hired, the manager's expenses at the store were up. So he told people that they would be expected to work off the clock, because there would be no overtime pay, which automatically kicked in after 40 hours a week, for those of us who were full time workers. The manager actually timed everyone out (all the floor employees were hourly, myself included), and we were expected to clean and restock the disaster that was the toy department as well as our own departments, and it wan't unusual to have to stay for nearly 2 hours.
You ask how we were "forced?" Well, we were given a choice. "Do it my way, or the highway." We were told that if we didn't do what he wanted, and work the extra hours at no pay, we'd be fired, and given bad references. Back then, nobody thought about suing or anything like that. A few people did refuse to work, and they were fired on the spot and told to get out. And knowing some of the people, I was told that they were given VERY bad references by the manager, and had trouble getting another job.
Mark
By what right can one worker, or a group of workers, tell someone not to work? If I want to do a job for a particular wage, by what right can other workers in that industry forbid me from doing so?
If so, then it is not the business of workers to care about the interests of the owners or CEO. And the union is the best way to promote workers interests along with electing the pro-labor politicians. Everybody for his own.
If the few get too much and many get too little it is dangerous. Too much wealth or power corrupts while poverty demoralizes. Jealousy is a natural instinct like thirst or fear or feeling of pain or sexual desire, it serves a purpose.
Without instincts the mankind would die out.
I agree, the guilds would be much better than unions.
But bringing back the guilds would require the restructuring of our entire society
Unfortunately.
You sound very much like a totalitarian. This is America, not Poland of 40 years ago. We like free enterprise. Go away.
And I mean that in a nice way.
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