The Bonuses Paid to Execs not Performing and the Actors Public Rampages

[Julianne]

Christian Bale's temper tantrum made me do this...but it also applies to the politically charged bonus payouts to the Priveledged Few.


This is all I have to say in the matter

How effen dare you?



This is NOT about party politics so please don't go that way.

It's about my own aggravation about "entitlement"....I really hate that.

[Cobaltblu]

Huge payouts to executives are ridiculous and are all about a culture of egotism and exaggerated importance.

While it may be true that a CEO is in the proper place within a company to make high-level decisions which may eventually make or break a company, that doesn't mean they personally are responsible for the success or failure of the company.

A company is a team and no one person is solely responsible for the success of the company.  While a CEO may eventually make a decision, there is a team of assistants and lower-level employees who do the real evaluation work and legwork.

I simply cannot see how the work performed by any one person could be 100 to 1000 times better than the work performed by another member of the company (I.E. ratio of executive to worker pay).

If an average professional employee makes $70,000 base salary, a top executive who makes $1.4 million dollars makes 20 times their salary.  I think that is a reasonable salary for the work done.

Now if a person started a company and worked to grow it into a successful multi-national company themselves and still own the company they can have whatever salary they like because the company is their property.

For public-traded companies the stockholders deserve a reasonable executive salary and not 40 or 50 or 100 million dollar yearly salary and executives who spend 1.5 million dollars to redecorate their office.

Regards,

CB

[DeadBishop]

It almost appears the bonuses are funded through all of the freed up labor from firing and laying off all the people at the bottom of the corporate ladder...that would be you and me.   

[Grov]

I haven't researched the rest of the story behind the Bale "Blow-up".  You know the media isn't going to lay it all out for you.  What if he's the producer and putting his own cash on the line and this guy keeps screwing up something?  I don't know but that's an example where I can see me losing my temper.  Hopefully not to that degree, but you know Hollywood,  If it's not drama, it's not money.

Golden Parachutes are bad.  I liked the Ben & Jerry payscale model before they got bought out.  Top guy cannot make more than 7 times as much as bottom man.  That certainly allows for a fat paycheck at the top, by normal middle class terms, but once you hit that limit, if the big guy wants more, the little guy gets more.

[ADraeger]

Speaking as someone who's been behind the camera as well as in front.... I don't blame Bale for losing his temper. I'm honestly surprised it wasn't the Producer's rant.  If you listen closely, you'll discover that it's the second or third time the DP has interrupted a scene (for no reason other than stupidity).  It takes a HUGE amount of concentration for an actor to be believable.  Surrounded by cameras, lights, tons of people - not to mention having to do more than one take at times AND going at it repeatedly for 8-10 hours (depending on Union contracts)- it is difficult enough when things go right... let alone with someone highly paid and highly ranked (the DP, that is) behaving like a sixteen-year-old production assistant.

[Tipsy Gypsy]

I simply cannot see how the work performed by any one person could be 100 to 1000 times better than the work performed by another member of the company (I.E. ratio of executive to worker pay).

Agreed, but as the old saying goes, "Them wot has, gits."

(feeling a bit cynical today...)

[Trillium]

Funny this subject gets brought up today...  I just read an article in the local paper, Galveston School District is asking for employees to volunteer to resign so they don't have to layoff anyone.   I think it said they are looking for about 130 to volunteer.  They are offering a 1% salary bonus if you've been employed for less than 5 years and 10% if you've been there more than 20.  The ironic part is they listed the top salaries, which are of course the superintendent, assistant superintendents and HS principal all making about 150K or more.  If we're asking for sacrifices on behalf of the district, how about a cut in pay them???

[SirRichardBear]

Same old same old actors have been throwing tratrums since the time of the Greeks most likely since the first time a  caveman stood before the fire and showed how he hunted the great cavebear. 

Execs have always gotten just think of the bonuse Joseph got from the  Pharaoh give him. 

I have a hard time getting up set about human nature.

But I do agree with Teddy Roosevelt
Probably the greatest harm done by vast wealth is the harm that we of moderate means do ourselves when we let the vices of envy and hatred enter deep into our own natures.

[Noble Dreg]

Speaking as someone who's been behind the camera as well as in front.... I don't blame Bale for losing his temper. I'm honestly surprised it wasn't the Producer's rant.....

I do hold him accountable, an act of pure imaturity.  No one, and I mean NO ONE should be treated as this Bale clod treated this man.  Have an issue?, then have him fired.  If one is as happless as you say this individual was then be done with him...fire him for performance but respect the man.  Chivalry demands respect, even more so to those lesser than you.  I heard the rant, my opinion the man is a pig.  It has ruined the Batman series for me and I will not go see terminator.

Bale and the big execs lack the same thing, a basic respect for their fellow man.

[Grov]

I'm still not going to pass judgement on either the DP Or Bale.  I don't know enough about the event to make a sound rational opinion.  Either way, I am virtually uneffected by the entire affair.  If that's what passes for news these days, we have much bigger issues to be concerned with rather than one man bitching at another.

Move along folks.  Nothing actually important here.

[Noble Dreg]

Move along folks.  Nothing actually important here.

Sorry Grov, I respectfully disagree.  How one man treats another is indeed important.  When we forget that, we are no better than jackels fighting over carion.

[anne of oaktower]

Move along folks.  Nothing actually important here.

Sorry Grov, I respectfully disagree.  How one man treats another is indeed important.  When we forget that, we are no better than jackels fighting over carion.

Actually, you are both correct.  We should, indeed, be concerned with how we treat our fellow human beings...however, this would never have made the news if it had not involved a celebrity.  I think Grov's point was that there are more important issues in this world that the media should be focusing on, and compared to some of the global issues (wars, the economy, etc.), this really isn't all that important.

[DonaCatalina]

I don't know about Actor's rampages but I have a problem with banks taking their
entire marketing staffs to Vegas for a week on taxpayer funded bailouts. I'm glad that public outcry finally made Wells Fargo cancel. http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/090203/business/wells_fargo_vegas_1

These Financial Executives have lived like Oriental Potentates for so long
that they have become tone-deaf to reality.
In Searching for a Corporate Savior: The Irrational Quest for Charismatic CEOs, Harvard Business School professor Rakesh Khurana documents the problem of excessive CEO compensation, showing that the return on investment from these pay packages is very poor compared to other outlays of corporate resources.

Basically they all serve on each others board of directors. Everyone votes obscene compensation packages for everyone else
and rationalize the expense because they can always lay off another 1000 workers and make the remaining employees cover the extra work.

Can you say unpaid overtime or you'll be laid off too?

This all started to get much much worse after Phill Gramm helped dismantle a lot of the financial fire walls that were created in response to the 1930's Depression.

Now the bubble has burst and the economy is a shipwreck.

[Blackjack Roberts]

I can't really say much about the economy, having spent 9/10 ths of my life on the weed puller end of that stick and having been homeless more than once. I assure you, life can put anyone at the bottom of the barrel at any given moment. Economy not withstanding.

Perhaps it's when the economy goes bad and more people are affected that it gets more press and notice. From experience I know that even when the economy was supposed to be good there were more than a few of us who sure couldn't tell it.

As to the Christian Bale thing, I often find there are two sides to every story, and came across this for anyone who may be interested:

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/39984

[Grov]

Ooo, nice link.  I wondered what the rest of the story might look like.  Glad I didn't get egg in my face by withholding judgment.