I agree philosophically but no-one had a better idea.
Yes, the alternative is to have the people who own the company and took the risk of having that ownership profit, fully realize consequences of owning bad companies at bad times…let them fail. Let the free market determine the winners and losers.
You think the “stakeholders” of these companies had been lucky enough to knock it out of the park and become rich because of it, they would share?
This is all so messed up. There isn’t a place anymore for free marketers.
No, the government is invested because some folks in Washington decided that the government should be invested in these companies. Businesses fail all the time (a necessary part of free markets) without the government rushing in with loads of freshly-printed dollars to “rescue” the entity. The current situation of government owning majority stakes in companies is due to decisions by folks in Washington, not because companies were failing.
By the way, as a shareholder (via the federal government), how do I make my voice heard on important company decisions? In other public companies where I hold shares I am allowed to vote on certain measures (e.g., BOD members, proxy issues). How do I vote for AIG proxy issues? Will we have a national election prior to their annual meeting so that we the shareholders can vote on the issues? What happened to taxation without representation? Isn’t this a case of ownership without representation?
I also believe this fear has been created. The economy is not in a depression. The gov’t’s only existence is for power and this was another door to kick in to get more…create docile citizens through fear, while they bleed the treasury of all the citizens wealth…
That works for every company except ones in which every single person in the country is a significant stakeholder. If you have a 401k or interest in a financial instrument of any kind you did not want to allow the institutions who were on the line this winter to fail.
I think most 401ks have an option for investing in US Treasuries or some other money guarantee’d instrument. NOBODY makes you buy stocks. The group mentality is a cop out.
Who cares if they fail? Nobody is entitled to investment or financial instrument returns.
I will agree to this ONLY IF we as taxpayers can institute a Pay For Performance Bill on our Congressmen and women. How about every year their salary goes before the taxpayers for a vote and we get to decide whether their performance has merited or not. I mean techincally they are working for us, aren’t they?
Amen
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I will agree to this ONLY IF we as taxpayers can institute a Pay For Performance Bill on our Congressmen and women. How about every year their salary goes before the taxpayers for a vote and we get to decide whether their performance has merited or not. I mean techincally they are working for us, aren’t they?
Excellent idea. Two issues: First, Congress would have to draft and pass the bill calling for the vote on their performance; second, Congress only *theoretically *works for us.
If you really want to hit them in the pocket book, Congress would have to to draft and pass a comprehensive campaign financing bill. But don’t count on that one.
***Why else would Gates, Soros, Buffet, John Kerry, Kennedy’s, etc all support this? ***
Gates, Soros, Buffet, Kerry, and Teddy all support it because they’re uber-liberal and support statism. That wasn’t the question though. The question was why are we letting it happen? The people who voted for Obama did so, among other reasons, because he promised to redistribute wealth to their benefit. You simply can’t support something like that unless you’re envious of anyone that has wealth in the first place and are hopeful that the government will find some way to take it away from them and close the “gap”.
BTW…I refuse to type in pink font. Sarcasm should stand on it’s own, especially if you know the author…if mine failed to come through this time, it’s my fault and I apologize. 
Agreed, but we get a chance every 4 or 6 years to vote their asses out, why the hell these people keep getting elected is beyond me.
I still think alot of the problems we face stem from the lack of term limits, they have become american royality, and love the power and money that comes with the job, they serve themselves and their ideas more than us.
It is scarey to think, but what if the President and Congress really go amuck, who is going to stop them?
They do make too much damn money. Everyone at AIG should be unemployed right now because they ran a failed business.
But Bush and Obama both felt the need to take your money and give it to the losers who failed.
yay
I don’t believe this is happening in the United States of America.
As to why we are allowing it? We’re “allowing” it because the average Obama voter honestly believes that those rich bastards make too damn much money as it is and it’s time someone knocks them down a peg. Obama is doing exactly what he promised he’d do. He’s finding ways to redistribute the wealth wherever he can.
Just for kicks i have a friend who’s a constitutional law professor. I’m going to ask him how a bill would get passed if the majority of Americans agreed to it but congress did not. I’m not sure I’m going to like the answer though.
"But Bush and Obama both felt the need to take your money and give it to the losers who failed. "
Not for nothing, but not every division or portion of AIG failed. As I understand it, one division of the company failed so huge that it put the entire company in jeopardy.
*Just for kicks i have a friend who’s a constitutional law professor. I’m going to ask him how a bill would get passed if the majority of Americans agreed to it but congress did not. I’m not sure I’m going to like the answer though. *
**
Let us know what he says. The constitution says all laws are drafted by Congress, but I’ve thought about what it would take for average Americans to petition for a new law. We would have to lobby Congress to draft the bill and that takes a lot of money, access and influence. Does anyone here have any of those? If we got the massess involved then we would stand a chance.
“I’ve thought about what it would take for average Americans to petition for a new law”
Isn’t that supposed to be sort of the whole idea? You lobby/petition your representatives for what you want?
“We would have to lobby Congress to draft the bill and that takes a lot of money, access and influence.”
We’ve already got those. They’re called lobbies.
Yeah no worries…I figured you were…you know how some people can get sensitive on here if you question them.
I agree these guys are all uber liberal, and i truely believe it is because they don’t want others to be a rich as them. They lose the limelight, the notoriety, the NEED from other people for them etc…
These guys do NOT pay the tax rates we pay. Buffet actually CHALLENGED the other billionaires in the US to admit that they pay less, as a percent of their income, in taxes THAN THEIR SECRETARIES!! Nobody else would admit it.
So why do they support someone so blatant about redistributing wealth? Because THEIRS WON’T BE!!! The steeper the progressive tax curve, the harder it is to climb.
Between the ultra rich (think hollywood as well), the first time voters who have no clue about money, and the middle aged stay at home mom who always watches Oprah and lives for the feel good story, this guy was a shoe in…SUCH a mistake.
And don’t think I don’t see that GW started it on the way out…he sold out in the 9th inning. Sad.
And we celebritize politicians why? Why do we let it happen? I agree with you on this…jealousy. PERIOD.
“Do you think that future related bills could extend this line of thinking to what you charge or what profit level you can obtain?”
Government already does this. Most rates for government contracts are set out up front, we do lowest bid contract awards etc.
GSA MOBIS schedules detail exactly what you will charge the government, and they have to approve it up front (with the explicit agreement that you will give them a discount from the agreed upon rates).
“What is you work for a non-profit that gets government dollars? Ca they then determine appropriate compensation?”
This I don’t think they currently do, but theoretically could.
I’m going to the Tea Party April 15th. I’ll let you know how it goes. I’ve been dormant a long time but I’m not going to sit idle while the country I grew up knowing gets taken away from me, my kids and grandkids. I’m both saddened and angered by the direction our country is headed.
No irony but there are huge swathes of the country that felt exactly the same way for the last 8 years, and Mojo et al can call them stupid but my feeling is that they are here to stay. No one was interested in getting them on board for the past 8 years so its hardly surprising at all that they feel no need to extend an olive branch to the now disenfranchised right…
My feeling is its unlikely to go back the other way, few people are going to vote to have the government provide them with less.