Conservatives enjoy railing against what they see as a bloated pension system among government employees. Said conservatives also fail to mention that those same government employees would have typically earned much more salary-wise throughout their career had they been employed by the private sector — you pay for what you get.
And while Bruno Behrend does his fair share of such ranting, he also is rather disillusioned by the current state of overcompensation among the corporate CEO set even though they are typically a staunch ally (not to mention funder) of conservative candidates and causes. So while it may raise an eyebrow or two for those who haven’t been reading or listening to Mr. Behrend, it comes as little surprise that today he joins with libertarian-leaning liberals who fight for fairness and have long decried the huge and growing gap between the haves and the rest of us (ie, the CEO-to-employee income gap).
Here’s Mr. Behrend on the recent announcement of AT&T CEO Ed Whitacre, Jr.’s retirement. (He cross-posts at both his blog and Illinois Review which I take to mean Mr. Whitacre’s wheel of fortune winnings really get under Mr. Behrend’s craw):
Speaking of Obscene Pensions…
AT&T CEO Whitacre may end up being the biggest Pension Pig of all. As an aggressive (and accurate) critic of the obscene pensions showered upon “public servants” (quotes indicate sarcasm & irony), I find corporate retirement packages - along with the often unwarranted ‘parachutes’ they get for bankrupting their companies - just as vile, but for different reasons. [emphasis is original to BB's post]
Come now Mr. Behrend, when’s the last time a public school CEO … I mean superintendent … received a retirement package that included $25,000 per year for a country-club membership? 
Now Hascat at Illinois Review gives Mr. Whitacre the benefit of the doubt in by commenting some of that jackpot will be spent on charities, goods and services and in the long-run benefit the economy. Pres. Reagan tried trickle-down voodoonomics. It didn’t work back then either. Based on the history of such wealthy individuals it is much more likely the bulk of the money will be divvied up between political contributions, some charitable giving (which could also mean deductible political-philosophy contributions), and any heirs.
Mr. Whitacre, by the looks of his past donations (which, while bipartisan, skew Republican) is Mr. Behrend’s political ally, whether Mr. Behrend likes it or not. Perhaps if he finds Mr. Whitacre’s pension jackpot to be obscene he ought to speak a little louder and a little more often to his fellow conservative friends, many of whom seem to buy into the goofy notion of socio-economic darwinism which would dictate that Mr. Whitacre has earned such an “obscene” retirement package by virtue of being better than all the rest of us (ie, a somehow more ‘evolved’ citizen-worker).
COMPLETE TANGENT: Maybe our state legislators will be reminded of all this when they settle on voting for or against AT&T’s “TV 4 us” malarkey.
“TV 4 us” is the shell political organization set up by AT&T to introduce a false sense of competition to the near-monopolistic cable industry. This group, oddly enough, runs the exact same TV commercials across a great many states, not just Illinois, to chide citizens to call their legislators and “support HB such-and-such” (check out all those yellow, “non-video choice” states on their website’s map). Go figure.
I’ve always wondered who they consider to be the “us” in their group’s name? Is it we the people, or is it AT&T and their jackpot-winning CEO retiree? And I’ve always wondered why they consider more of the same (albeit with a different name, and a cell-phone contract as part of the bundle) to be “choice.”
True choice in cable TV would involve a la carte channel options so that folks with, say, tots could pick Nick, Disney, Noggin, etc. and avoid F/X and the other basic cable channels ill-suited to kids. It would also work for home-improvement fans who could pick every DIY channel under the sun while foregoing the channels they don’t want, etc. Bachelors could get all 19 ESPNs, plus the Golf Channel, Bowling Channel, and Squash Channel — while not having to buy Lifetime, Oh! or the Hallmark Channel (vice versa for the gals).
Then again, who would watch all 500 channels with nothing on them if we weren’t forced to buy them all at once? (Gee, maybe that’s why there’s no a la carte basic cable.)
7 comments
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April 28, 2007 at 3:12 pm
Greg
Can’t remember if its the median income or average income of a government worker versus a private sector employee. But in Illinois and nationally the government worker makes more. There are several states where they make more, as well.
April 28, 2007 at 8:20 pm
Bruno
Rob,
Whether Whitacre succeeded as he did out of luck, talent, lobbying, or a little of both, it is hard to argue that he didn’t create value for his stockholders.
My beef is with the Boards of Directors and the CEO class that basically feels entitled to perks beyond what their talent deserves, particularly given that it come at the expense of either the shareholder or the employees.
To compare Whitacre with a school Superintendent (accurately portrayed as a CEO of a district) is another matter, in that a district is a ficticious creation of the State government that creates NO VALUE…
[ I could argue that it destroys value - in that it wastes money, fosters a narrow-minded parochialism on the part of rich soccer moms, and foists an obscene educational apartheid on the disadvantaged, but that's probably obvious to the intelligent reader]
… and the Superintendent is therefore nothing more than a patronage job created by a powerful lobby, as a a good 90% of his administrative underlings.
As a thought experiment, let’s take 892 districts Supers and multiply them by an average salary of $100,000/yr (and obscene amount of money for a worthless patronage position, and I’m sure the IL average is higher). Keeping you up on your math practice (previous posts indicate you need some) that comes out to $89,200,000/yr.
Add the obscene “end-of-career” bonuses that inflate (FOR NO ADDITIONAL VALUE ADDED TO ANY CHILD’S EDUCATION) their retirement, and the greed soaked Mr. Whitacre looks pretty good in comparison. At least Whitacre added value to a stock price.
All the 892 superintendents did was suck down salaries pushing paper from desk to desk while 10s of 1000s of Illinois children got a substandard education and the remaining got a medicore education at too high a price.
___
As I stated, both are obscene, but for different reasons.
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In closing, let me point out to your readers that these issues go far beyond your (and far too many of my “conservative” compatriots, to be fair) shallow “ideology bashing”.
I’m a concerned citizen who approaches issues, problems, and solutions from a conservative (and somtimes libertarian) perspective. I have no problem with debating these issues with concerned citizens who have differing ideas informed by different ideologies and backgrounds.
I posted my views on Whitacre because this great nation is dying from a loss of character and decency, and the greed of the Education Monoploy and Corporate CEOs are merely one manifestation of this hollowing out of our individual integrity.
This is why your barbs about “my political allies” is so off-base, as well as counterproductive. My “political allies” are people who want clean up our government and debate the big issues straight up and with intellectual honesty.
Though I can understand some of the arguments for bipolarity in politics, one of the things I’ve noticed over the years is that the 2-party system (and the shallow left-right thinking that it is based upon) is rapidly breaking down.
Your attacking me for posting on an issue upon which we probably agree is evidence of that phenomenon. Have a nice weekend.
April 29, 2007 at 12:25 am
robnesvacil
Greg, Please find a cite and the stats to back up your claim. I’m not denying, it’s just hard to agree or disagree with no facts behind the words.
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Bruno, In our neck of the woods, the school district adds value — if you want to speak in purely economic terms as you do in your aside. Is this true across the board? No. But there are a great many factors beyond the school disctricts’ control which also influence both home values and educational outcomes… As any intelligent reader would recognize.
April 29, 2007 at 7:05 am
Greg
Yes, evidence exists. I plan to do a post on it. It’s a good myth buster. Yet, I’m agnostic on the costs-benefits. The idea that dead weight only exists in govt. is just as pernicious.
April 29, 2007 at 9:07 pm
robnesvacil
Greg wrote: “The idea that dead weight only exists in govt. is just as pernicious.”
It seems like you, me and even Mr. Behrend agree on that point. Even though I agree with him, albeit from a different angle, you’ll note Mr. Behrend felt I was attacking him instead of agreeing. Odd, especially since I’ve never “bashed” anyone’s ideology, political or otherwise, on this blog (I may disagree, but disagreeing is hardly “bashing”).
Rather, I point out their inconsistencies, innaccuracies, hypocrisies and downright falsehoods — and maybe that feels like “bashing” to them. In this case, I was highlighting that Mr. Behrend was a bit hypocritical in his own continuous “bashing” of superintendents. (Which he demonstrates again in his comment, and again without actually proving his point that he thinks superintendents are worthless paper-pushers. He even goes so far as to compare all superintendents’ combined salaries to a single corporate CEO’s salary, an odd apples to oranges comparison.) I furthered that highlight by pointing out Mr. Behrend and Mr. Whitacre are likely political allies, with both leaning to the right (this based on Mr. Whitacre’s history of slightly bipartisan, yet heavily-weighted to conservatives, donations).
May 2, 2007 at 10:35 pm
Bruno
Rob,
Re: “your Superintendent”
…Add value compared to what? Some are worse than others, and some may be decent people, but the expense of their existence is a net loss from any angle. (except theirs - which I freely admit I care not a whit about)
First, if more money = better education (an easily rebuttable presumption under current current spending levels), then the money could be better applied to classrooms or hiring more qualified teachers (not necessarily from a closed class of “certified” drones) than to a paper pusher rubberstamping pointless Springfield mandates.
Second, if we can educate kids better on the same (or less) money, then the economies of both the education sector (freed up & absent the bureaucracy) and the entire state will improve by returning the unecessary salary to the taxpayer.
I could propose all manner of experiments to prove that I’m right, none of which you (or your district) would be able to attempt under the current Soviet school code. (Lucky you. Lucky Superintendent.)
Either way, I will be proven correct in my lifetime. The system you defend is unsustainable, both in its waste of financial capital and human potential.
Re: political allies & Whitacre…
Your view only holds in the nonsense world of left v right and Dem v. Rep., which is rapidly failing to meet any needs of its putative constituents.
Where Mr. Whitacre supports lower taxes or fights tax increases, I guess we are allies. Where he, and his class of CEO narcissists, drain their corportations of capital while growing “value” behind a wall of lobbying, there is no ground for agreement.
This would be obvious to anyone living outside the “left/right - Dem/Rep” matrix.
May 3, 2007 at 4:06 pm
robnesvacil
Bruno,
The only candidate or political ally any citizen will ever agree with 100% of the time is their own self.
As I’ve already indicated in earlier posts and comments, others have conducted the experiments you mention and they have proven no better (and in some cases, worse) than the current system of public school districts. Perhaps you are ignoring these facts in favor of finding the exceptions to the main (of which there will always be a few available for those who enjoy semantic gymnastics).