Angry Senator: Let's Cap Wall Street Idiots' Salaries

Brilliant. First time I actually mean it. :-)

It's about time someone said something.

Let's also cap senators' salaries.

awesome maybe she should run for prez next time

Yes! then again, I'm not a Wall Street idiot, so of course it seems like a reasonable suggestion.

I'm just a college graduate who spent three years of the Bush I administration unemployed despite filling out an average of 10 job application forms per day, spent the Clinton administration years working hard, saving money and investing until I had $16,000 in mutual funds and $10,000 in bank accounts --- and lost every penny of it in the first five years of the Bush II administration through no fault of my own. I live frugally, work seven days a week and do not use drugs (except for a cup of tea in the morning and the occasional Alleve pill for migraine). Currently, my entire income is going toward paying Bank of America, which decided to raise interest rates, lower credit limits and gouge me for $39,000 that I never borrowed. So what do I know?

If I were king, Wall Street idiots would consider themselves very lucky to have their salaries capped. A fairer penalty would involve paying back everything they took that was not theirs to take.

The idiots are the elected officials who voted for TARP and didn't put any stipulations on how the money was to be spent. There is no place in our constitution that allows our government to use taxpayer money in such a manner. I say get rid of the career politicians.

YAY! MORE Government screwing with the free market! They shouldn't have given the money to them in the first place, it never was going to work. Now they are just putting more fuel on the fire.

Senator McCaskill makes me proud to live in Missouri.

I don't like the Wall Street Idiots, but I like the idea of the government telling people how much they can earn even less. But if they're gonna do it, let's go all the way and cap baseball players' salaries. Movie stars, too.

Angry Taxpayer: Let's cap Washington idiots' salaries and terms.

"You can’t use taxpayer money to pay out $18 billion in bonuses."
Stockholders can vote their shares. Unless you hold a majority, you don't have anymore say than the next stockholder.
Shut up and vote your shares.

@Nicholas

Here's a tissue to wipe your tears:
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It's a horrid idea. Government has no business in the details of salary caps ... The strings req'd in TARP shoulda been outlined in the first place, not after the fact, and we can see what a CF this whole thing has been. Additionally the salaries on WS tend to be well below par for the position, but the bonuses are part of the total comp -- these aren't really "performance" bonuses. More akin to paying waiters below min wage knowing the tips will make up for it. Granted, it's disgusting what Wall St did and the shape of things today, but a lot of the problems were Govt over- and under-involvement in the first place. It's all disgusting but the Govt was the one who put TARP into place in the first place ... speak of the disgust, sure, but it's ridiculous to start setting wages.

Great idea! Even better would be to stop throwing good money after bad, and let those companies fail. Some other investors will buy up their assets at whatever they are worth and will see an opportunity in serving customers (i.e. the public), and will do so with new management. Who ever learned anything without having to bear the consequences of BAD judgement and STUPID decisions?

While we're at it, let's cap the salaries of actors whose movies bomb, rock stars who issue dud CDs, TV entertainers who fail to attract an audience. In fact, let's cap the salaries of everyone who makes more than I do. It's only fair.

This a dangerous idea. TARP was a new jerk reaction and this is a knee jerk reaction as a response to the first one. Blame needs to be placed on those that voted to give these firms our money without stipulations. Wall Street may be filled with greed, but it is also the engine to the US (and world for that matter) economy. Yes these people are greedy, but they have also been very good at growing the US economy over the last century. If salaries were capped at $400k, they would all have no incentive to stay in the industry. Why do you think the US is so powerful? Why is the US dollar the global standard? Why is the US the global stock and bond marketplace role model? What we have as a system may not be perfect but its the best system out there. But, before the politicians go and decide to give out buckets of my money to private businesses they should have thought long and hard about it.

I think it`s called communism...É

Where can I sign?

Bravo!!

She's awesome.

It's sad that we have to essentially baby sit these corporations just to insure that they don't do the wrong thing, like say--spending 50 million of taxpayer money to buy a luxury private jet.

One of those ideas that sounds cool, but is actually stupid.

The premise of TARP (although not necessarily the execution) is that some banks need to be kept afloat in the short term, because they provide the financial backing for all the companies that keep us employed. Starbucks does not run on operating revenue, it floats debt - and so does Boeing, and Yahoo, etc. These companies also needed cash to start up - cash that was provided through banks.

The idea is to provide a temporary cash injection into these banks to keep them alive long enough for them to repay the loans. It might not work because the banks suck, it might not work because they're crooked, but that's the idea.

Now, suppose you're a banker that makes a couple million a year - not at all unreasonable an assumption. If you're the guy that brought the financing together that allowed America to create Google, a couple million is certainly fair compensation. You suddenly find that your salary has been cut to $400k. What do you do?

You go to a competing, non-TARP bank that will pay you your old salary.

Result? All the top talent flees TARP banks, and they fail anyways - only this time they fail with $700B of our money!

Do you people like throwing your own money away? Because that's exactly what you're doing. We are now shareholders of these banks. We own them, and their employees are our employees. Guess what happens when you underpay your employees? At McD's, they'll give you the "special sauce" out of spite. Want some banker giving the economy the "special sauce"?

What the hell is Giuliana talking about? Is he serious?

Gooo Claire! :)

ridiculous, I would be outraged if the gov regulated how much I could earn for doing my job

Does it bother anyone that her personal net worth exceeds $19.2M? Another man of the people who took $500K from Emily's List......

Hell Yes!

And lets not limit it to bail out money. Any special tax priviledges at any level of government. If Wal-Mart gets a tax break to build a store in a town, that company should have salary caps.

And not just salary caps. Require that at least half their employees be Americans, that they be paid a living wage, and full health benefits.

If companies dont like it STOP TAKING TAXPAYER MONEY!!!

I'm sick and damn tired of this corporate welfare crap, and the conservatives above who think it is OK for corporations that take corporate wefare to do whatever the hell they want, are not really conservatives.

i don't think it is up to the government to cap salaries.....first step of a socialist society. the individual business entity should govern salaries. i agree with the dislike for exorbitant salaries as no one human is worth that sort of compensation no matter what. in essence, you are asking the government to cure the ills of society (greed). what next, cameras watching your every move?

Not a bad idea. This whole bailout is just the last administration raiding the candy jar one more time before they left office — with Congress driving the getaway car.

@Evean. When you say, "they would all have no incentive to stay in the industry." Who cares? These guys obviously didn't do anything good when they were making billions, so let them go be failures elsewhere.

This is the problem with government bailouts. Where do you draw the line between government and private business.

If you like big government, your going to love the Obamassiah's bail out ...

Sanctimonious bilge! When a john puts money in the nightstand, does he doesn't tell the hooker how to spend it, does he!? Wall St. whored itself for the tax money, it can spend it however it likes!

The gov't has no business telling a private enterprise how to run their company.

If the execs want to go out on the sidewalk and give the money away or set it on fire that is between them, their shareholders, and their Board of Directors.

It's not the gov'ts business.

No bailout money. No dictation from Washington DC.

Period.

The news these days is more and more like reading "Atlas Shrugged" By Ayn Rand.

Lynch'em.

Free marketers, you're the ones who got us into this mess in the first place.

Salary caps all the way.

Anyone who thinks a cap would remove the incentive for Wall Street bankers to stay with the company has absolutely no idea how many thousands of bankers there are around the nation who'd leap at the opportunity to earn that much.

That, combined with the fact that OTHER $400,000 jobs don't grow on trees in this economy would be PLENTY of incentive for any decent hardworking Wall Street bankers to stay.

@PhliiyMark: you say McCaskill's worth $19.2 mil? Isn't that like the pot calling the kettle...?

Do I think this is legally viable or possible? Hell no. Would I like to see some kind of retribution on these assholes who are squandering the money they begged and pleaded for? You're damn right I would.

Communism is lurking in the US Senate ;)

Who's business is it what you make? You and your boss, the IRS and nobody else. The minute you get to decide what someone else makes (even though you have no personal financial interest in it as in you're the boss) then what's to stop someone else from deciding what you make?

Think about the taxes these people are paying. Now, remove those bonuses and you remove the tax revenue. Is this a good thing?

Spreading the misery is not a solution for getting us out of this mess.

How about the Senators on the Finance Commitee who pushed Freddie and Fannie to back loans to those would could not repay them in a misbegotten sense of social engineering?

She's Brilliant!! She should have been Vice President at least. It's all about Change!!! Change this crap! We bailed out these @$$holes and they give out bonuses for people who consistently SCREW UP! I swear this is one of the smartest if only the smartest politician ever! And to the people reading this who are scared, this isn't communism. You obviously did not make above 400,000 dollars this year. My taxes went to these creeps! I want revenge! Read what the Senator said, and this time pay attention, if a company receives MY MONEY, AND YOUR MONEY to bailout their FAILURE, they should have their @$$es owned by ME, YOU, and the FED!

What a colossally stupid idea.

Hey, I have an idea; let's put a cap on how many laws the Congress can enact. And for every one they enact, they need to nullify another.

Well, the bailout money should be used to, let's see, pay our teachers more, our cops more, our anything that is a just service to our country. I have read comments that this is Communism.. well giving the money to these people is socialism...NOT what our country was intended for. I am VERY proud that she is my Senator! I work hard for my money and they should as well. Stimulation of our economy was a BAD idea to begin with. It did not need it, that was the Elitist Heads of state that wanted more money in their own pockets rather than the people who are suffering in this bleak union under the current Stars and Stripes.

This is a wonderful idea. Some of you are really missing the point and making huge leaps in logic to call it socialism. Anyone who has taken out a loan - for college, a house, etc, - knows that you get approved for that loan based on the worthiness of the investment and repayment *and that the use of funds are restricted exclusively to the purpose of the loan.* You can't get a loan to fix the foundation of your house and use the money for a trip to Europe instead. It's the same premise here. If the government is using tax payer funds to bail out Wall Street then the funds should go *only* to the intended purpose: making the companies solvent so that the national economy can rebound. NOT rewarding employees with disproportionate bonuses in a year that resulted in large-scale bankruptcy and a downward spiral for the entire nations economy.

I've never worked anyplace where the bonuses are large in a year that the company has underperformed - Wall Street should be no exception. Taking federal funds to fix their mistakes should come with certain criteria for how those funds are put to use - that's what any one of us would be subject to when getting a loan and Wall Street shouldn't be above the same restrictions.

"She’s Brilliant!! She should have been Vice President at least. It’s all about Change!!! Change this crap! We bailed out these @$$holes and they give out bonuses for people who consistently SCREW UP! I swear this is one of the smartest if only the smartest politician ever! And to the people reading this who are scared, this isn’t communism. You obviously did not make above 400,000 dollars this year. My taxes went to these creeps! I want revenge! Read what the Senator said, and this time pay attention, if a company receives MY MONEY, AND YOUR MONEY to bailout their FAILURE, they should have their @$$es owned by ME, YOU, and the FED!"

no, i didn't make 400K last year...did you? I pay taxes as well. you sure have bought into the "class envy" being pushed by your overlords. do some research.

Lip service.
To little, to late.

And to the other idiot post:
No one wants to cap ALL salaries.
Just the ones that are able to keep their jobs thanks
to the taxpayers.

Why should John Doe, out here digging ditches for $10hr. have to pay bonuses to a bunch of over paid jerks to run their Co. in the friggin' ground.

And something else you never hear about is, How much of this so-called bailout do you think will end up back with lobbyist and therefore back in these crooked politicians overseas accounts.

GD a politician and their thieving lying ways!

You do that and all of the talent will leave to go to other companies where there is no cap. Then all of the money that the govt. "invested" in those companies would be at risk because the right talent would not be available to fix those companies. Money is used to retain (large bonuses) or attract (large salaries) those who are able to solve these types of problems. Without those people these companies would have much lower survival odds which means we will never get our money back.

Does everyone forget that the govt. helped create this mess? Where were these Senators 2 years ago? Probably happily spending the tax dollars being created by the large salaries and bonuses being paid to these executives.

Dave
Talent! What friggin'talent?
What color is the sun in your world?

This grates against my inner objectivist, but the key phrase here is "company that accepts federal bailout money." She's absolutely right - these idiots shouldn't be getting bonuses with tax dollars. But then again, the government shouldn't have handed these horses' rectums a free check to thank them for ruining the economy in the first place.

.

"Hey, I have an idea; let’s put a cap on how many laws the Congress can enact. And for every one they enact, they need to nullify another."

No, for every one they enact, they should get rid of two.

"Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard" - H. L. Mencken

Yay democracy?

Every member of Congress should be limited to two terms and be limited to one House, after that you leave Washington and go back where you came from. No more lifetimes spent in Congress. They should all live in dormitories, have cubicle offices and make minimum wage. They should have HMOs for their healthcare and pay into Social Security. No more lifetime retirement. There should be no lobbiests. When in session every congressperson is required to be there. Three absences without an excuse from their HMO doctor and they are fired. No more "fact finding" junkets. No more expense accounts. They can eat at the cafeteria for free but anything else they can spend their own money. Bills have to be clean. Nothing not specifically related to the bill itself. Every state gets federal money based on population, size and infrastructure needs. No longer does one state get the lion's share just because they have a congressperson on the right committee. Until they are willing to live like their constituants they have no business in private business and that includes bailouts with taxpayer money. It'll be painful but let's let the chips fall where they may.

Cap their salaries?
Where's the incentive to perform any better?

The real solution is to have shareholders realize that they own the company, and to use their share votes to pay the execs what they're actually worth.

Well done lass. These people get paid for what they do at levels most of us working folk would, at the very least, have to win big in the lottery to see.
I personally feel if it takes $100,00+ to get these people "motivated" they should all be digging ditches and slaughtering chickens somewhere for the public good.

Conservatism: The government should not give a dime to the private sector and should stay out of their business. If their companies fail, so be it. Was the plan to "help" as many people as possible to gain control over them? Are there fascist-socialists? More importantly, are there any in the US Senate?

We all knew when said CEO's wouldn't fess up on what they were going to do with the money that it would be for nefarious reasons....

I did some quick (really quick) math and it appears if all politicians at all levels take a 10% pay cut, the country would save one billion dollars +

I vote that we use the money to fund this scam and use it to fill the FDIC coffers. Let the banks die off as they should and the individual saver still has their money. We get a stronger banking system and the individual keeps their money. But this model makes too much sense and would not allow the government to take over yet another piece of this once free country. Naturally, the path they will take will be the one to reward their rich friends and leave the tax payers and many generations to come holding the bag.
What will it take to get this revolution going, people?