Stop Criticizing Big Bank Bonuses
Well if you can’t beat’em, join them. The issuing of big bonuses in the face of not being able to afford them is not always a bad idea. Here is the plan in a nutshell:
Well if you can’t beat’em, join them. The issuing of big bonuses in the face of not being able to afford them is not always a bad idea. Here is the plan in a nutshell:
Essentially, America’s decisions, material or not, are being made in Washington by persons who are susceptible to lobbying. Those lobbyists create incentives for Senators and Representatives to vote according to the narrow agenda set by those who the lobbyists represent rather than for the good of America as a whole. Over the past decades or longer, the American people have suffered greatly and now America is financially crippled. For example, how did unregulated Credit Default Swaps become acceptable in the minds of the public stewards in Washington? Notwithstanding how or why, the reason we are here today is that we do not pay our Congress people near enough.
No lobbying firm, however, can match the power of the US Treasury. The people should demand that Congress be put on a very simple bonus plan. Every Congress person who serves during a legislative session which actually passes a budget that cuts spending 10% or more from the prior year should be eligible for a $5 million dollar bonus, payable immediately after the budget is passed. We spend less than $2 billion dollars in bonuses to ensure we cut spending hundreds of billions of dollars. Those unspent billions can then be used to pay down the national debt while the people who voted to reduce America’s spending are handsomely rewarded.
Year over year hundreds of billions will go to pay down the national debt. America could amortize anything with that kind of payment each year. Also, with this new incentive plan, the most talented people will run for office. Finally, the lobbyists would have to work harder and harder for less and less of the budget pie. It is all good.
If the greed of recent day demonstrates anything, it demonstrates that this plan is infallible. Let's get America going again by issuing these giant bonuses. We can thank the bankers later.
