Fixing Compensation

[legalmoose]

A slate.com article with good ideas about fixing executive compensation. For too long the men and women who serve at the top of American corporation have had too many ethical conflicts of interest, which has lead to some of the current financial mess. This presents a good way out of it, without otherwise unduly inserting the government into the process.

Comments

[jarlsberg71.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I like it, but how does a shareholder get a voice? I mean generally people don't own large percentages... and the board of directors might have 51% of the stock meaning they still get to decide who gets what?

[l-strange.livejournal.com]

We've crowd sourced everything else out there. Why not shareholders and fund holders?

Hmmm... let me answer my own question. In part. Individual shareholders, even organized, have little leverage with regard to institutional investors. The rise of the 401k/401a/403b/TSP/etc has meant that more American's have money in the market, but those funds are not directly controlled by the individual but by organizations like Fidelity/T Row Price/Vanguard, which add a further layer of indirection and opacity to the mix.

Try this... try to get daily fund activity from your investment firm. I can get RSS feeds on the price of stock just about anywhere in the world, but the composition of my retirement? I have to derive from quarterly reports. And stockholder voting; I guess I have to say there has been a slight improvement in that my fund managers now have to inform and justify their position.

But there is no feedback loop for (small) investors, and few if any alternatives to move to. (Which we are perfectly happy to not ask about, you know, when the numbers are going up.)



So what? ... Yeah, we're kinda screwed. There are some highlights though. Movement to have executive compensation packet voted on my the shareholders. But then, yeah, we're right back to who really has the power as a shareholder. I'd really like to see the investment firms demonstrate who's side they are on. Technology is a remarkable thing, they could really use it more than saving me getting my quarterly statements via mail.

[richie73.livejournal.com]

thanks for posting that.