450SEL6.9

The buying of self esteem and self identity is someting that I believe comes from America's obsession with celebrity. The west has gone that route and I don't think it is coming back.

I find it disturbing that companies like GM, up to their neck in trouble, find the necessary resources to parade a host of celebrities to "sell" their cars and endorse their products. There was a time when companies tried to drive sales by thinking about how to make a better product and not what celeb we can get to prostitute our product.

Personally, I think the biggest delusion is buying a diamond to show your love for your wife! How did that originate? There's no rule that says no diamond = no love for the wife. It is a marketing gimmick.

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Snake Vargas

Heh. Every time I come back (I'm working these days guys, sorry - I can make it back maybe once or twice a week, but there's 2000 posts waiting..!) I bump this thread again!

Anyhow, good point Rob. The buying of an identity is really quite prevalent now. The advertisers and marketers attribute image and emotions onto their products, which would otherwise be an object of utility in itself. Then, people buy into the image, as they think about how they would like to be. It's a way of trying to show who you are through your possessions, and do it quickly, too. Buying is a lot easier than changing yourself, or letting others know what you are like through getting to know you, and your words and actions.

Also, from this, there's a strange obsession with image. I have read somewhere (I think it was in the blurb or a review of a book or something) that a store that couldn't sell a heap of sweaters raised their price and moved them from a bargain bin to near the usual products. They sold more quickly that way! Thus - perhaps there was nothing intrinsically wrong with the product, just that people who shopped there didn't want to see themselves as cheap, and thus wouldn't buy a low priced sweater. I'm speculating, but not without reason.

How about a Nike t-shirt? Or some other designer t-shirt? Does the logo make it better? I'm not saying all t-shirts are created the same, but sometimes the price of those things are ridiculous. At some point you've stopped paying for the product and are paying for the label, as it were.

Then, on buying a diamond for your wife - well, it's a cultural thing. I can't remember when it originated, but it wasn't always so. Let's not even mention that if you decide to buy only an 'average' diamond (according to your means) that it could be seen as you not loving your wife, if not by her then perhaps by others! However, I say, dare to be different and do it for your own reasons, if you are in such a position.

Snake Vargas

This has been on my mind lately. I've had discussions about the moral dimension of companies that sack their workers to hire overseas, usually to cut costs and therefore increase profitability.

Is it right that the CEO could well get a $X million bonus for increasing profitability by reducing costs, such as by sacking workers? Sure, the savings are probably greater than the bonus (sadly, thanks to the often large numbers of people they sack), but the morality is therefore all the more lacking. Why is it necessary to offer a bonus? Do CEOs find it hard to live on $5 million or whatever, and need more? Couldn't they have saved the jobs of even 10 workers with that, for a period? Stalin has been quoted as saying (paraphrasing for effect) that a million deaths is a statistic, but one death is a tragedy. When hearing about sackings in the media, the numbers roll off and we move on; but every one of those people is a person like you and me, and they have lives, families and emotions. The companies have a legal right and perhaps even some sort of sickening financial responsibility or mandate to make a profit (for their shareholders), but the social justice aspect of their actions is often sadly ignored. Governments might not be held up as the epitome of social caring, but in my moments of cynicism about the world at large their regulations often the last hope that many have, who would otherwise be 'rationalised'.

This rant aside, there's a global justice to this, somehow. If looking beyond our borders, giving jobs overseas is sort of an unintentional benefit to the workers in foreign lands. Sure, they get paid peanuts, comparatively, and their working and living conditions may be that much worse. But these people, by and large, choose to work in these conditions over either unemployment or other work. Eventually they will then move up, and become the newly affluent. The same cycle will happen to them, since there are enough poor in the world to last a long, long time. The only thing is that people in the companies' home countries generally aren't that amused, and perhaps as a social problem like you said, Rob, then it's an important one.

But we each can do what we can do - if the company does something you don't like, whether this or some other issue, then do something about it. Be prepared to make sacrifices, though it's often not easy. If your bank sacks call centre workers for overseas ones, you could close your account, and let them know. If a company is taking unfair advantage of communities overseas, and you own shares, then sell them. It's easy to think that you don't make a difference, and then continue on.. and perhaps your one action won't make a difference. But the alternative is doing nothing, and then that's a sure way that you won't make a difference.

One more rant, now. I guess it's easy to pick on these 'other' people, these nasty companies and their nasty CEOs. However, when we want to invest and get a 10% return, when we go shopping and become obsessed with the lowest possible price, and when we work and become obsessed with getting the highest pay possible, then what we're doing is affirming, promoting and indeed living out the culture of greed, where we want more. It's this that gives companies a mandate to rationalise as much as possible to make profit. Thus, the sackings, the poor quality, the imported products made in China or whatever. When people are only prepared to pay the minimum, companies can either go cheap to compete, or stick to their guns and hope people can see some sense. Then again, my dilemma is whether paying a higher price necessarily equates to better pay and conditions for workers, and such - essentially, whether the more money I pay ends up distributed fairly to workers and society, or whether it ends up only in the pockets of the bosses.

Imhotep Evil

found this on Forbes: - ONLY REGISTERED AND ACTIVATED USERS CAN SEE ALL LINKS - CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

Also roberto about new wave of poor taste rich people.
Don't sweat it, it happened before (in Europe so many times).

450SEL6.9

I like your rant about corporate CEOs, SnakeVargas. However, you are partly responsible for what these guys make. I'm assuming you've bought a share or stock of invested money in an investment/mutual fund.

Personally, CEOs making scandalous amounts of money is a problem that we, as investors, created ourselves. Most stockholders in companies don't bother to vote on what directors are elected. We throw away our proxy forms and allow bad directors to stay. These bad directors end up approving huge compensation deals for CEOs even when our stocks go down! When we all realize that we let the wrong people manage our companies, hundred of millions of stockholders' money has already been paid out. We're all to blame.

Osnabrueck

Thanks for pointing out that article Imhotep.

So basically - the rich are getting richer, but the poor are also getting richer.

Osnabrueck

You're right. CEOs don't make obscene amounts of money in Germany because there isn't the corporate culture there to support such behavior. The CEO as lord and savior is, for the most part, an American (and perhaps British) phenomenon that all investors are part and parcel to.

For the most part, there isn't evidence to support the claim that top managerial talent is worth anywhere near the money being paid today.

450SEL6.9

There isn't any real evidence to support that a $100 million per year CEO does a better job of returning value to stockholders than a $500,000 per year CEO. They justify that $99.5 million difference with stupid subjective terms like "relative compensation."

Correct me if I'm wrong, Osnabrueck, but aren't Germans still distrustful of corporations? I'm having a discussion in another thread about a German banker who was blown up in his armoured Mercedes and he was just one of many who have fallen to the same fate.

The pay packages for European and Japanese CEOs are much lower. The "Celebrity CEO" is an American concept that costs stockholders billions of dollars. They compete with each other on things like who has a better golf club membership, who has the more advanced corporate jet.

Osnabrueck

Distrustful would be too harsh a word. No, Germans are just more pragmatic. In the German corporate culture, talent is still poached for large sums of money, but we're talking mostly about engineers, designers and the like. People who can actually prove their worth in the field of battle.

German CEOs and upper management are paid what they're worth, which is to say that they're paid significantly less than the "power CEOs" of American multinationals and the like.

Hypersonic

I don't think I said anything about the "poor taste of some rich people" IE ....but you are correct, there is nothing new about some super rich people having poor taste.

In the 17th and 18th centuries, the finest furniture makers in France were commissioned to create objects for the great houses all over Europe. A lot of the furniture made for the aristocracy of Eastern Europe was much bolder and more flamboyant than the furniture made for the French aristocracy -- the French taste was more subtle and refined -- many Parisians considered the tastes of Eastern Europeans (particularly the Russians) to be vulgar and showy.

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