Too Big to Fail: An Executive Suite Story

[marmar]

from Too Much: A Commentary on Excess and Inequality:



Too Big to Fail: An Executive Suite Story
February 26, 2012

If a blunder you committed cost your employer $4 million, how long would you stay employed? In America today, a CEO can cost his company $4 billion and still collect both a paycheck and a bonus.

By Sam Pizzigati


People in America get fired all the time. Break too many plates as a dishwasher, lose too many games as a coach, miss too many deadlines as a reporter, you’re going to be history.

We need this accountability. We couldn’t function, as a healthy society, without it. But accountability has to be universal. To create and sustain excellence, no society can hold only some people accountable — and give others a free pass.

Yet some societies — deeply unequal societies — do give out free passes. All the time. In these unequal societies, grand accumulations of wealth translate into grand accumulations of power. The powerful make their own rules. They rig daily life’s games. They come out winners no matter how poorly they play.

Consider Randall Stephenson, the chief exec at telecom giant AT&T. Stephenson had a bad year in 2011. A really bad year. His decisions cost AT&T over $4 billion. What price did Stephenson pay for this debacle? Last week we learned that price — and much more about the dysfunction that defines us. ..................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://toomuchonline.org/too-big-to-fail-an-executive-suite-story/