For the last 30 years, neoliberals have fixated on a simple program: “Get government out of the way,” which meant reduce taxes and regulations. Business will invest more, which will produce a higher growth rate and greater prosperity for all. The belief was that unfettered capitalism could solve all ills.
That’s not how this children’s story is turning out.
Read more...Ryan Grim and Mark Gongloff of Huffington Post described one of the key mechanisms by which CEO pay has risen to stratospheric levels: cronyism and backscratching among board members, many of whom are also CEOs. And that’s not the only one that gets less attention than is warranted.
Read more...You cannot make this stuff up.
Read more...Normally I try not to pay much attention to Davos because it is meant to reinforce the idea that plutocracy is simply a manifestation of natural aristocracy.
Read more...Yves here. It’s become tough work keeping up with the continuing large gap between Dimon hagiography in the media and his dubious accomplishments. So hat’s off to Bill Black for staying on this beat.
Read more...orporate executives love to peddle the notion that they need to have their low tax payments reduced even further, even as the share of GDP represented by company profits is at unprecedentedly high levels.
Read more...The best political system that money can buy is doing a great job for its customers and a lousy job for the rest of us.
Read more...One mantra you see regularly in the business and popular press goes something along the lines of “the CEO and board have a fiduciary duty to maximize shareholder value.”
That is untrue. Moreover, the widespread acceptance of that false notion has done considerable harm.
Read more...Even casual scrutiny will tell you that the current ridiculous levels of CEO pay bear no relationship to anything other than their highly developed rent extraction skills.
Read more...Whatever happened to innovation in America?
Read more...When union members demand decent pay levels and work conditions, they are charged with featherbedding and overmanning or the new neoliberal catchall, “demanding uncompetitive wages”. But when the upper crust loots institutions, the mainstream media is typically missing in action.
Read more...The first article in a series by Black on the remarkable, in the bad sense of the work, work by Nobel prize winners on regulation.
Read more...By Wolf Richter, San Francisco based executive, entrepreneur, start up specialist, and author, with extensive international work experience. Cross posted from Testosterone Pit.
The ominous term, “competitiveness” has been bandied about as the real issue, the one that causes European countries, in particular some of those stuck in the Eurozone, to sink ever deeper into their fiasco. To fix that issue, “structural reforms,” or austerity, have been invoked regardless of how much blood might stain the streets. And a core element of these structural reforms is bringing down the cost of labor. But productivity, infrastructure, transportation costs, corruption, training and education, etc. all figure prominently into this equation. Cost of labor is not the only factor.
Read more...One of the striking elements of the demonization of Cyprus was how it was depicted as a willing tool of Russian money launderers and oligarchs. But notice another implicit part of the story: that Russia’s oligarchs and “dirty money” are distinctive national creation. Do you ever hear Carlos Slim or Rupert Murdoch or the Koch Brothers described as oligarchs?
Read more...It isn’t clear how effective the pushback against stratospheric top-level compensation will be, but the howls in the European media suggests that the corporate overlords really are concerned.
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