Regulate pay to those who got stimulus funds? (wages, salaries, companies)

[NSHL10]

Since the govt has now decided to cut or regulate the pay of CEOs of those companies who took TARP money, should they do the same for those who received stimulus money? I can understand people demanding that companies getting taxpayer money should be regulated somewhat, so should the same hold true for the stimulus plan?

Should CEOs of GM take a 90% pay cut?
What about school district administrators, chiefs of police, mayors, governors, heads of construction unions? All of these groups received tax payer money, so should they be regulated as well?

[DC at the Ridge]

Originally Posted by fopt65

Since the govt has now decided to cut or regulate the pay of CEOs of those companies who took TARP money, should they do the same for those who received stimulus money? I can understand people demanding that companies getting taxpayer money should be regulated somewhat, so should the same hold true for the stimulus plan?

Should CEOs of GM take a 90% pay cut?
What about school district administrators, chiefs of police, mayors, governors, heads of construction unions? All of these groups received tax payer money, so should they be regulated as well?

I don't understand this question. School district administrators, chiefs of police, mayors, governors, already do have their pay regulated. Judges, too.
Since I don't live in a union state, I'm not sure how construction unions decide to pay their officers, but I would think that union have some sort of regulation involved.

There seems to be a canyon of difference in ideas about pay and compensation between the upper echelons of management in major companies and banks and other financial institutions, and the ideas of the majority of Americans. Merit-based pay for Jack the mechanic is related to the quality of work and the profitability of the company Jack works for. Somehow, when your company is to any degree responsible for the country's economic woes, and your company needed federal funds to avoid bankruptcy, and even then went into bankruptcy, then I would question how you feel entitled to merit-based pay, and bonuses. Even in the old days when people were paid by piecework, there were minimum standards for that piecework, and if what you'd made was sub-standard, you didn't get paid for it. But bankers getting rewarded due to the number of deals they made, evidently weren't concerned that the quality of deals were so marginal that they would eventually cost the company and the company stockholders money.

These finance managers and CEO's keep talking about the "culture" of their workplace, and stressing that in order to keep "quality" employees, they must keep these wages extremely high. But, there are a lot of talented, intelligent people who would work for these companies at substantially lower salaries. The "culture" of their workplace grossly underestimates the pool of such "quality" employees. Certainly, there are some with specific knowledge and skills that give a foundation to their value. But the "culture" these CEO's seem to cite is really just a small group of people promoting themselves as an elite group, who have developed a culture of elitism to support their viewpoint, and that culture is not founded on actual value.