printable version PDF version

Inverted Values
by finch Wednesday, Nov 15 2006, 12:11pm
international / social/political / opinion/analysis

An Australian corporate director who FAILED to perform was recently relieved of his position; he nevertheless was able to walk with a $30 million severance package. This case is not uncommon, directors who fail to perform ensure they win regardless of other factors. Public companies are milk cows for these unscrupulous types.

This case attracted the scorn of the federal treasurer, who rightly stated that no director of any company is “worth” the monies this character was able to extract from the public. True as that statement may be, the treasurer omitted to state that conservative governments such as his, made it all possible. Conservative governments are the favourites of Corporations. Political parties that favour regulation in the public interest have little chance of attracting the enormous funds required to wage winning campaigns; it’s all sewn up, corporations rule via compliant proxy governments.

However, wealth continues to be generated by every worker/employee, yet the value placed on each worker/employee (indicated by incomes) varies wildly! All major corporate failures today are the direct result of failures at director level – the top layer of ‘valued’ employees is also the most incompetent, it would seem. The income of directors actually reflects the amount of damage or loss they are able to inflict on a company – their salaries/incomes incorporate a form of bribery (‘extortion tax’) very similar to the overt extortion gangsters extract from hapless victims.

Directors are able to maintain their benefits while companies and shareholders sustain losses! In view of the fact that directors are totally reliant on the expertise of others (who are valued less) it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to justify the huge disparity in income between directors and other employees.

Upper echelons of Corporations are environments inhabited by elites of extremely dubious character. The world’s leading capitalist nation (USA) is at present displaying its ugly, criminal, real face to the world. The illegal invasion of Iraq was first the result of a corporate take-over of government, then via its people in government, Cheney, Bush, Rice etc, the course of an entire nation was altered to serve the interests of a few Transnational Corporations. The fact that hundreds of thousands of innocent people have lost their lives as a direct result of corporate greed is irrelevant.

A public resource in the form of the nation's military was marshalled to serve the interests of capitalist plunder and the profits of a few. Look no further for the perfect example of Capitalism’s culmination – the total devaluation of human life, the environment, law and civilised values for the sake of profit!

The Australian treasurer’s remonstrations are to no avail, a recent address by oligarch Rupert Murdoch spelled it out perfectly, “administrations come and go”, but Corporate power remains.

A power exists that could easily eradicate nihilistic Corporate dominance from the earth but that power resides in a ‘Lion’ that at present believes itself to be a sheep.