Greed Is Good
Henry here. In Oliver Stone’s 1987 film Wall Street Gordon Gekko declares: “Greed is good.” That is quite a different fix on greed to the historic attitude of the church. Greed was always considered by the church to be one of the seven deadly sins. It wasn’t good, it was the fast track to Hell.
When I look at the incredible financial rewards received by managers of funds and banks which have lost billions of dollars, it is clear that greed gets richly rewarded in the modern financial landscape, even if competency doesn’t. These managers walk away rich, even when they have lost astronomical sums.
How astronomical? According to inequalaity.org, the average overall compensation for the 200 C.E.O’s of big American companies was nearly US $12 million. These are the rogues who have lost billions of dollars and thrown the American economy into a tailspin, which may result in a full scale world wide recession, or even a depression.
It is beyond belief. From my point of view as a simple investor, they and their boards should all go to jail. But, of course, they won’t. It will be an extraordinary situation if they even feel or admit their guilt in wiping out millions of people’s real-estate or portfolio value. So the little guy hangs on hopes he has enough for retirement, and that he will not loose his house, and be out on the street.
Seems to me greed is still a major sin and destroyer of people’s lives.