Sunday, November 11, 2007
What's sauce for the shareholder doesn't touch the CEO
An op-ed in the Washington Post, William S. Lerach pretty much says what anybody who has invested in a large corporation that stumbled or fell has said too many times. How come the SOB's who fucked up get to go down in a gold plated elevator while the shareholders get the shaft?
But what about accountability for Wall Street CEOs who line their pockets while making stupid decisions that rob shareholders and pensioners of billions of dollars? Recently, corporate boards have been fundamentally misinterpreting the phrase "the buck stops here" -- and handing the bucks over to their miserably performing bosses....Why, indeed! You can say that, with options and stock grants, they keep themselves in Fat City without having to pay for it. Or that most boards aren't going to be too hard on their best buddies. Or that politicians are too desperate for the mothers milk of their campaign money, q.v. Cheesy Chuck Schumer. But the simple fact is that all us small people have no protection when those who are supposed to look after our interests, ignore them in favor of their own self interest.
....The real frustration is that there's so little that can be done. Shareholders supposedly have access to the courts for a remedy, but they won't get far. A stockholder suit filed more than two years ago challenging the Morgan Stanley payoffs languishes in court. The CEO-and-director club knows that pro-business judges in the corporate haven of Delaware and elsewhere in the legal system will protect them. Shareholder suits against Time Warner's Levin got nothing back from him.
The government -- forget it. The SEC, and even Congress, appear to be getting ready to cut back shareholder rights and court access even more. And the Justice Department is busy defending waterboarding and targeting Democratic activists. Why do you think corporate bigwigs behave so badly so often?
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