Income Inequality

[teachercd]

9 minutes ago, RedDenver said:

Maybe post something funny 

A horse walks into a bar...the bartender says "Why the long face?"

[BigRedBuster]

2 hours ago, Making Chimichangas said:

 

If everyone does an "important job" within the company, then why are people at the bottom paid so little relative to those at the top?

 

 

 

 

I said, we can talk about the wage gap all day long and I would probably agree with a lot of what you have to say.

 

My only bone of contention is when you imply that CEOs don't do anything to make the company money.  Which...is totally BS.

[Making Chimichangas]

25 minutes ago, BigRedBuster said:

I said, we can talk about the wage gap all day long and I would probably agree with a lot of what you have to say.

 

My only bone of contention is when you imply that CEOs don't do anything to make the company money.  Which...is totally BS.

 

Okay, fair enough.  You're a CEO who actually contributes to his company's bottom line.

 

In the company I work for, all our locations are warehouses.  Each warehouse is independently run by an Operations Manager.  The Operations Manager manages inventory, orders stock, processes core returns, balances the monthly budget, etc.  We have sales people who liason with our customers and suppliers, they assist with processing orders and/or special ordering products if we don't happen to have something a customer needs in our our inventory.  We also have a website maintained by an IT department.  Our CSRs  customers can call to place orders.  We have warehouse people who receive product, scan it into inventory, and stock it back on the shelves.  Dispatchers and drivers who take orders off the printer, (from sales people, CSRs, the website) pull the products, and drivers deliver those products.  Drivers also handle product returns and assist with inventory control.  All this activity occurs without any actions by our CEO or executive team.  In the company I work for, all the CEO and executives do is: a) take six figure salaries that they don't work for or earn, and b) constantly tell us we need to make more money.  

 

And as @RedDenver has mentioned: He has worked for several Fortune 500 companies and they could easily get rid of half the executive staff.

 

You may not like what I am saying, but it is closer to the truth than you probably will ever admit.

 

Look, I am not saying you're a terrible person.  Hell, I don't even know you.  For all I know, you might be the nicest, most genuine, and actually caring CEO ever.  Which is great. 

 

But if you're honest, the majority of your fellow CEOs don't give a flying rat's arse about anyone in their company below the executive level.

 

If you all, as an aggregate group, actually DID CARE about your lowest and mid-level employees, income inequality wouldn't even be a topic to discuss because it wouldn't be an issue.

 

Listen, I am all for CEOs being well paid.  I have no issues with a CEO who makes even 30-40x what the lowest person in his/her company makes.  But in today's corporate world, CEOs are making 400-1,300x what the lowest paid person makes. 

 

Would you agree that is completely outrageous?

 

So let me ask you: what is a solution, in your opinion, to the income inequality problem?

 

 

 

[ZRod]

You're story is pretty anecdotal. CEOs are responsible for the the entire company, which is why the collect that high compensation. Their decisions make or break the company, and like BRB pointed out they are often traveling quite a bit, and networking at conferences/conventions to setup the company for success.

 

You can make the same argument Reddenver did about any major corporation. That kind of bureaucracy is just a natural part of company growth. Some eventually lean out, others don't and keep on chugging along. It is what it is.

 

Unfortunately CEOs are now more beholden to shareholders more than their employees, aka the bottom line. There's no incentive for them to pay well, other than losing talent to companies who do pay better. And in the case of manual labor jobs, why both? Labor there is a dime a dozen, and training is minimal and inexpensive. They'll just replace anyone who leaves with someone who can do the same job with a couple weeks training. 

 

You're really only going to fix pay through minimum wage, tax incentives, or a better educated work pool.

[Moiraine]

Income inequality itself isn’t a problem as long as taxes are high enough that the basic needs of a huge majority of people are met. I.e. we need free health care, we need the GOP to stop cutting welfare programs, college should be cheaper. We can easily afford all of that with more logical tax rates and I think it would actually help the economy to keep more people on their feet.

 

Low tax rates cause the super rich to hoard their money, not pass it down to workers. It seems much more logical to me that more money in the hands of the poor and middle class would lead to a better economy. Way more logical than trying to reduce taxes on the people who can afford to pay them, anyhow. And if someone is earning $500,000+ a year, it’s not solely from their own hard work. They have the benefit of living in a country where it’s possible to do that and they also have enough $ to influence politicians, although not all do it. They should be paying more taxes. It makes the country a better place for all of us.

 

 

As an aside, I don’t agree at all that CEOs don’t work hard or that anyone can do it. Being smart is important, and I’m assuming most of them are. I would think the dumb CEO is an anomaly. They’ve usually earned not having to do manual labor by being smarter and more capable than most other people.

 

I’m just a normal salaried worker but I do no manual labor and I definitely don’t work as hard as anyone who does, or even as hard as a cashier (non manual labor) does. But thanks to what I’ve learned, I’m doing something many people can’t do, and there’s a lot of value in that. You can’t just value a position based off or how much they’re busting their ass. If I write a computer program/do an analysis in a day that saves the company a million $, then I’m worth a lot more than someone who’s taking phone calls. Those people are necessary, but there are a lot of people who can do it.

 

This same thing applies with CEOs. From my experience they have to do some things I’m incapable of. Like talk to people and sound really smart while doing it, and explain what we’re doing in a way that makes sense to a large variety of people.

[Making Chimichangas]

I found this Corporate Welfare to be utterly fascinating.  It is not a long read, but it's not short either.

 

I honestly didn't even consider stock buybacks as a facet of corporate welfare and one of the prime drivers of income inequality.

[VectorVictor]

On 7/27/2018 at 4:45 PM, RedDenver said:

I've never understood this way of thinking. Does putting pictures of Hitler or Mussolini up every time capitalism is mentioned change anyone's opinions?

 

Edit to add: Dictators and authoritarians suck no matter the economic system.

 

Some folks aren't intellectually adept enough to separate legislative style from economic systems. 

 

This is why you see all the negative herp-a-derp about Socialism, when we a) already engage in some facets of socialism already, and b) there are plenty of successful examples of socialist countries. 

 

 

[Big Red 40]

On 7/28/2018 at 11:52 AM, BigRedBuster said:

We can discuss wage gaps all day long and we probably would agree with some areas. 

 

But, I couldn’t let this paragraph go by without commenting. 

 

Im a CEO of a company and I care deeply about everyone in the company as do one hell of a lot of CEOs. 

 

First off, if I’m taking orders or filling orders, why do I need people like you working in my warehouse?  Are you going to quit so the CEO can do your job?  

 

Second, as an example of why I’m not in the warehouse filing orders, I left home on Sunday to spend valuable time representing our company at industry meetings which have built a good reputation amongst current and potential customers....you know....those people whose orders get filled?  I’m sitting in the Dallas airport....still not home. 

 

Also, I spend a hell of a lot of time on financing issues that allow us to pay wages for people in warehouses and to fund growth which allows us vto hire more people. 

 

I started in this company at the lowest level and worked hard at every level to get here and I still put in long hours away from family to manage the company so it is successful for everyone. 

 

Im not writing this for a personal pitty party. I love what I do. But, the attitude in this paragraph is frustrating and does nothing to further the discussion. 

 

If you want an example of how a CEO does or doesn’t make the company money, study up on what is happening at GE. It was a very well ran company till the current CEO took over. Now it’s being ran so poorly that it’s not even represented in the DOW anymore. 

 

EVERYONE in the company does an important job to make it successful. 

 

 

Thanks for the insight  from the “other side” . I work for a huge corporation and the only thing I know about my CEO is his name . He makes 150x more than I do in salary alone and I have very little idea what he does,  so it’s easy to point the finger at him and say he’s overpaid and doesn’t do anything . In reality he has far more responsibility and far more knowledge of the entire operation than I do so yeah he’s worth more,  just maybe not THAT much more . 

Heres a question . It seems to me that this corporation is set up in a way that it will continue to function well no matter who fills individual positions. I have a fairly important position  but I know if I didn’t show up to work ever again,  I would be replaced ASAP and the place wouldn’t miss a beat.

How about you ? Would your company fold if you never showed up again,  or is there a CFO, COO etc who could fill your spot and keep things going smoothly ? 

[Big Red 40]

On 7/28/2018 at 4:52 PM, RedDenver said:

I think you're confusing small to medium sized businesses with large corporations. I've worked at several Fortune 500 companies and you could have laid off half the execs and probably increased productivity and certainly increased morale.

 

Of course every company is different, but you'd need a mountain of evidence to convince me any CEO is worth 1000x any employee.

I agree there’s a big difference .

The company I work for started in the 40s as a small company where the owner ran things the way he saw fit . He knew everyone’s name and gave them a card in person every year for their birthday . Today it’s a huge,  diversified , publicly traded corporation. Personal touches like that are long gone and It’s a totally different animal than what he started . 

[RedDenver]

Mark Blyth on this podcast has a great analysis and analogies for how the economy got to where it is:

 

[Landlord]

On 7/29/2018 at 12:32 AM, Making Chimichangas said:

Each warehouse is independently run by an Operations Manager...

 

We have sales people...

 

We also have a website maintained by an IT department. 

 

Our CSRs  customers can call to place orders. 

 

We have warehouse people

 

Dispatchers and drivers who take orders off the printer

 

 

Sounds like a lot of people who have the CEO to thank for their jobs.

[RedDenver]

20 minutes ago, Landlord said:

 

 

Sounds like a lot of people who have the CEO to thank for their jobs.

???

 

Maybe whoever started the company, but not necessarily the CEO.

[Landlord]

That was mostly in jest. You can make a loose argument that the job of a CEO is to grow the company to provide more jobs to more people. Even if that's not the goal, if they're good then that's still a natural byproduct. 

[RedDenver]

2 minutes ago, Landlord said:

That was mostly in jest. You can make a loose argument that the job of a CEO is to grow the company to provide more jobs to more people. Even if that's not the goal, if they're good then that's still a natural byproduct. 

That's the usual thinking, but I'm not sure it holds. CEO's are far more interested in happy stockholders than workers, which can mean more hiring or more firing. And a lot of short-term instead of long-term planning.

[Ric Flair]

On 7/26/2018 at 6:43 PM, Making Chimichangas said:

@Big Red 40, lots of great information in your post, very well done sir!

 

 

I sincerely think there needs to be a national law addressing this.  It can be done very simply: Pass a law that states a CEO can only make 10-15x more than what the lowest paid person in the company makes.

 

Note this type of law wouldn't prohibit paying a CEO 26 million (or more) a year.  It would just mean that the lowest paid employee would earn 1/10th of 26 million if it is set at 10x the lowest salary.

 

 

 

Yeah, because if a greeter at Walmart makes $8 an hour, the CEO should be capped at $80 an hour. That seems logical...as does the government dictating wages. 

 

The people who whine about wage inequality would be a lot better served to spend that time bettering themselves so they can get better jobs. Envy is such a colossal waste of time.