As little as $10mm will….. - 14 Sep 09

As little as $10mm will get the …….. job done! I saw this in the paper the other day. Or maybe it was on TV addressing some effort requiring funding? As little as $10mm; is that a joke?

The switch in who has the loose wealth around the world has me worried. The economies of resources in the areas of such items as oil, electronics and even music are areas where enormous changes have taken place over the last fifty to sixty years.

The industrialization of softly derived wealth is amazing. No longer is there a corner on the market of “who’s got the bucks?” The names of the past are not the names discussed in today’s world. The Rockefeller’s, the Rothschild’s, the Carnegies, the Morgan’s and the assortment of Royals no longer are hold eighty-five to ninety-five per cent of all the wealth.

Oh, yes. Some of these guys went by the moniker of “robber barons”; but they also put a great deal of their wealth back to work in their respective countries and around the world.

Now we have people taking home $20mm for making a movie. We have people taking home tens of millions for recording CDs that don’t sound anything like music.

The Wall Street compensation packages are right up there with the above. Is there anybody out there that is really worth $13mm, $60mm or multiples of $100mm in salary to run a company that nearly takes the entire country, or maybe the globe, under? I don’t think so!

I do not agree with the government getting into the salary governing business. This belongs to the private sector solely; but they need to start doing a better job of policing themselves. But, who is gonna be the first to do so? This is a tough task to undertake when the bidding for top talent goes on in the manner it does.

It will have to be some board of directors that really is doing the job they were elected to do.

I guess you might point out the Bill Gates of the world and his philanthropic endeavors as a bright light. I have no real good reason for singling out Mr. Gates; he just sticks out in my mind. But where are the others? There should be others. Oh yes, Mr. Dell also comes to mind as I ponder the question. There are probably many others that just don’t come to mind directly or that do the same anomalously. I can only hope.