This blog is hard to post because about 90% of my readers (probably mostly conservative) will disagree with it. But with all due respect who are YOU to decide what is "fair" for company executives to be paid?
It angers me when all I hear is how people are so mad that AIG executives are getting huge bonuses when they in fact are one of the big reasons our economy is in the dump. I agree that they made some terrible mistakes and that their management should be punished. But let the owners of the company (stockholders) make those decisions. First for you who are reading this blog and have not read many of my past postings, you must read my blogs on CEO pay from many many months ago. With that in context, executives of the largest companies in the world make millions for a reason and so they should if the market calls for it. At the same time, contracts for these executives are sometimes considered "unfair" because to get these highly coveted executives requires huge payments or they will miss out on the best available leaders for the company. Keep in mind that sometimes bonuses are due regardless of a companies success in a given year.
Most importantly, if Government did not bail out these companies every time they made bad decisions, these companies would not reward executives who made terrible business decisions. But if the American federal government is going to give them our tax dollars, why should they not partially use that money to pad their own pockets when knowing that they soon are going to be let go? The solution- government stay out and let these businesses fail and if enough fail, stockholders might decide to pay closer attention to decisions being made and thus executives will not make stupid decisions that put their companies in trouble.
The reason it angers me is that politicians know how stupid we are and will cater to our feelings of anger towards executives and demand instead that they not get those bonuses. We then get excited because those politicians hear our complaints and are working so hard for us! The only problem is that the real PROBLEM is not being solved. That is, government stop standing by these companies and stop bailing them out and these over paid bonuses will not happen. Our attention is turned to the emotional issues of millions of dollars being paid to executives when it is the billions and eventually trillions of dollars that the government will spend to "fix" this economy when they are responsible in fact for causing the problems that needs to be fixed!
The other issues can not be explained so easily. But if you read my blogs from time to time you will know that economics is about costs and benefits. And even if you were to agree that government has gotten this one right and that these executives should not be allowed to receive these bonuses, there is a cost to government making those decisions. If government makes that decision why not other decisions? WHat about healthcare? What jobs are to be created? Prices of goods? That sounds like Socialism. Look at the countries that are socialistic. Is that what you want to live like? The cost of capitalism is that sometimes the free market might get it wrong. But the benefit of Capitalism and Free Markets is that it gets it right far more times than government does.
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Sunday, March 1, 2009
History of Prayer
It is amazing to me when I step back and study the surface of history about how much our forefathers and ancestors used prayer during some of the most important times of our nation's history. George Washington would not have become our first President nor a president at all if he had not survived the escape from New York to Trenton, New Jersey at the beginning of the American Revolution. He thanked God for a so called "Wind Miracle" that he prayed about for allowing this to take place.
When our Constitution was being developed in Philadelphia, Benjamin Franklin asked for everyone to take some time to pray at the convention when it looked like it might collapse. This was not a short pre-meal like prayer but a few days of prayer and worship. He said "Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it."
Just before the single largest ground invasion in our nation's history on foreign soil, Franklin Roosevelt prayed in his radio address for the brave men who were about to land on the beaches of Normandy.
Today in our time of Economic turmoil, our President does not call upon our nation to pray. There are no radio addresses or speeches made in congress to take a few days of prayer for our nation and its leader. There is only call for government to do more to help our economy although it is that same government that has screwed up our economy with bailouts and laws that have promoted and incentivize banks to make bad loans to people who can not pay them back. Instead how about the Church rising and praying that our leaders will get some backbone to stop growing government and instead allow the market(the decisions of thousands of companies and millions of consumers) to put financial institutions out of business who make bad decisions. Stop protecting companies and banks so that they are willing to risk failure knowing that government will help them and then one day they all collapse at once taking us into an economic recession such as we have now that could lead to near depression valleys. I personally do not believe we will see a great depression again because the Great Depression was based on the lively hood of so many people during that time. We are so blessed today with great things that even during the worst of times, people have luxuries that could never be considered depressing.
I'm asking our President Barack Obama to call upon our nation to pray and stop telling me about how the same entity that has nearly destroyed our prosperous economy is going to now fix it. Lets pray that we elect politicians that will stop passing laws in order to impress voters but do things that help our nation in the long run even if it does nothing to get them re-elected in the short run.
When our Constitution was being developed in Philadelphia, Benjamin Franklin asked for everyone to take some time to pray at the convention when it looked like it might collapse. This was not a short pre-meal like prayer but a few days of prayer and worship. He said "Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it."
Just before the single largest ground invasion in our nation's history on foreign soil, Franklin Roosevelt prayed in his radio address for the brave men who were about to land on the beaches of Normandy.
Today in our time of Economic turmoil, our President does not call upon our nation to pray. There are no radio addresses or speeches made in congress to take a few days of prayer for our nation and its leader. There is only call for government to do more to help our economy although it is that same government that has screwed up our economy with bailouts and laws that have promoted and incentivize banks to make bad loans to people who can not pay them back. Instead how about the Church rising and praying that our leaders will get some backbone to stop growing government and instead allow the market(the decisions of thousands of companies and millions of consumers) to put financial institutions out of business who make bad decisions. Stop protecting companies and banks so that they are willing to risk failure knowing that government will help them and then one day they all collapse at once taking us into an economic recession such as we have now that could lead to near depression valleys. I personally do not believe we will see a great depression again because the Great Depression was based on the lively hood of so many people during that time. We are so blessed today with great things that even during the worst of times, people have luxuries that could never be considered depressing.
I'm asking our President Barack Obama to call upon our nation to pray and stop telling me about how the same entity that has nearly destroyed our prosperous economy is going to now fix it. Lets pray that we elect politicians that will stop passing laws in order to impress voters but do things that help our nation in the long run even if it does nothing to get them re-elected in the short run.
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