Originally Posted by milky (Post 467889)

Seriously? You are basically asking for socialism.

Shareholders own the company whether you like it or not. Without them seeking to make a profit on their shares of your company, you have no job. Businesses do not exist to serve the 'common good.' They serve to make a profit.

With that straight, let's talk about CEOs. CEOs get paid exactly what the shareholders are willing to pay. The job is a very difficult job. If a company that is not doing well needs a new CEO, they have to be willing to pay a large sum to attract what they believe will be a CEO that turns the company around. With the higher chance of failure, talented CEOs are not going to come to a company without high compensation packages. It's all contracted. The 'greedy' CEOs do not come to the company and then write their own packages. So, your beef is with the shareholders who hire the CEO, not the CEO. But, refer back to the beginning of this post. You work for those shareholders. Without their desire to make a profit, you do not have a job.

The ignorance about corporations serving the public good is just Marxist ranting. Free market capitalism has proven to be the most efficient for the exact reason that everybody works in their own best interest. Nobody has your interests in mind better than you do. So, all the stakeholders come together with their own interests and the system works:
Shareholders: hire the best employees for all the jobs that produce the most wealth for the company. Any employee that you pay more than they effectively bring in in revenue is a loss to you. Pay too many people more than they are worth monetarily to your company, and you will eventually go out of business. So, the desire would be to hire the most effective people who produce the most revenue for the company for the lowest price which you can get them to do the most work
Labor: From the CEO down to lowly pilots in our example here, your interest is primarily to get the most compensation with the highest QOL. Notice that your primary interest is usually in direct competition with that of the shareholders.
The competing interests work to form a balance of supply and demand forcing the workers to only charge as much for their services as the market dictates while the evil corporation has to pay at least the amount that the market bears for the labor. If you ask for too much compensation, by definition somebody as equally qualified as you will do the job for less, so the company should hire that person. If the company offers too little compensation, then that means there is another company out there that will seek to take your valuable skills away for a higher price. Over time, these back and forth actions of employees and employers keep the market price of labor at the market price.

Lastly, there is no need to have licensing for CEOs. It's all described above, but basically, the shareholders have the desire to pay a CEO exactly a little less than the value he brings to the company. Likely, those shareholders will not hire somebody not qualified for the job if they desire the company to stay in business. If they make bad decisions and choose the wrong person for the job, it will decrease the value of the company. Too many bad decisions will cause the business to fail. Since a failing business would not bring value to the shareholders, we have to assume that they will not seek to do this. So, in their own 'greed,' the shareholders will always seek the most qualified person that they can afford that they believe will take the company where they think it should go (profits).

The scariest part of your post is that ignorance is a very scary thing. Your obvious lack of education on basic economic principals is the exact reason that liberals can rally support saying Marxist things about evil corporate profits. Did you know those evil profits are the basis of most of our retirement funds? Without the hope of high profits, there is no incentive for businesses to come to market and try their hand. Without those businesses, we have no jobs. Without a job, the only thing you will have is something new to bi%$h about.

Originally Posted by rickair7777 (Post 467995)

I worked in industry and other endevours for years, and made plenty of money (more than any w-2) so yeah, I know how it works.

We do not live in a free market or a capitalist society...there is no such thing in the real world, only degrees of socialism. The europeans have more than us for example.

The reality is that most shareholders are too diversified to have the time or knowledge to provide any real direction to the numerous companies in their portfolio...by defualt control goes to those few managers and institutional investors with large blocks of securities.

I've always been pretty conservative, but it's time to fix some things (I am NOT endorsing a presidential candidate...I'm not talking about campaign- promise change). Actually people who know me personally are rather alarmed that I feel this way...nobody ever thought it would happen :eek:

Originally Posted by HercDriver130 (Post 467893)

Well said by everyone. Management and there ineptitude has certainly cost this and many industries dearly. The Management labor relationship is like a marriage.... it takes both sides to make it work. And in some cases, labor has been their own worst enemy. When things are going good... its because both sides are doing everything they can to make it work... conversely when things are going badly EVERYONE must take some of the blame. Management and labor alike. Anyone who thinks or believe that Management and they alone are responsible for 100% of the mess of this industry is delusional. What % does it break out, I do not know. But I do know this, when a marriage fails and divorce happens, BOTH parties are culpable even if the blame is lopsided and I believe its the same in business, the airline biz....and every business.

Originally Posted by ChickenFlight (Post 467631)

Ironic that you bring up shareholders as the end-all, be-all motivation for corporations. As the financial sector collapses, many are quick to blame governments, homeowners, ceos and the lot for the collapse but much of the blame goes to those shareholders and their own irresponsibility. Shareholders pushed companies to take great risk hoping for great returns and the Bear-Stearns of the world obliged and the risk didn't pay off. Now we all get to pay that off. To draw a paralell to the industry look at UAUA stock a couple of weeks ago. It became painfully obvious that the bulk of UALs investors are short-term day-trader types that are only in it for the quick buck and will sell IMMEDIATLY the second any bad news is reported. SCARY.

To attract responsible investors (the ones you want), you need a better business model that represents long-term steady growth. The ONLY airline to achieve this growth is Southwest. Yes you can point to smaller airports, cherry-picking profitable routes, clever marketing and sassy flight attendants but the real reason Southwest has been so successful is Herb's greatest single statement (loosely quoted):

"There are three groups of people a business needs to take care of: First, the Employees, if you take care of them, they will take care of your Customers. If the employees and customers are taken care of, the Investors will inhearently be taken care of."

Herb put employees first and it worked. Other CEOs should pick up Nuts, Hard Landings and The Southwest Way if they want to learn how to run an airline.