The gap between rich and poor doesn’t matter
There has been a lot made recently about the gap between rich and poor getting bigger. In the UK, the opposition Conservatives blame Labour who have been in power since May 1997. Labour of course blames the Tories saying this is one of the legacies they inherited. Specifically they blame Margaret Thatcher, that bastion of evil, the wicked witch of the west. Their words not mine. OK I'm paraphrasing here but those may as well be the words they use seeing as Mrs Thatcher is blamed for pretty much everything that has gone wrong in the UK since 1980. Considering that she hasn't been in power since 1990, you'd have to say her powers of destruction would be up there with the Dick Dastardly, Lex Luthor and all other super-villains rolled into one.
Funnily enough plenty of research will support both arguments, but my thinking is that the premise doesn't matter at all! Why should society care about the gap between the rich and poor when in fact we should only concern ourselves with the poor?
I believe that it's the level of poverty in our society that really should be the focus of government and by extension the society itself. If opportunities are made available to the poor (I don't mean benefits and welfare!) and our leaders are able to mobilise society to reach for those opportunities by being aspirational, then I think we will be in a better place.
I know that others also rail against aspiration and say it's overrated. That's correct if by aspiration you mean getting the cars, bling, flat-screen TVs and Armani jeans. No my friends. Wanting to get those things is NOT aspiration. That's just being materialist. Aspiration is when a person wants to make a lasting difference to their WAY of life, which results in material benefits being a by-product of the hard work that's been put in and the success it brings. As one commenter put it in the article linked to above
If the top of society becomes too rich, (which I don't think there is such a thing) then that's not a bad thing. What matters is how poor the rest are and whether or not the rich do not take advantage of them. Should you care that Richard Branson has x billion in the bank when you and your wife have a combined income of 40,000 per yr, your kids go to a decent school and providing they work hard they can make it through university? That would be just stupid right? It's bordering on envy, and that's pretty much where this whole debate on the gap between rich and poor seems to lead to.
Coincidentally university education, which is one of the traditional means for aspiring working class kids to uplift themselves, has been made way more expensive by the self-appointed working class party. Labour. It's ridiculous to blame the Tories for the society gap which supposedly increased more during the 80's because Thatcher brought this country up to date economy-wise. By spoon feeding the poor Labour has stagnated the living conditions of the bottom 10% which I believe is the true crime. I won't go into that debate too much right now, but I believe Labour (and the Tories when they get in) should just concentrate on providing opportunities to the poor and making the conditions that will enable us to help ourselves.
If the rich get richer during that time, I couldn't care less. And that is why I don't begrudge the bankers, footballers and other high earners. Just so long as you all can be a banker, doctor, footballer or MP, had you wanted and been able to.
Blair confirms his status as world’s dumbest smart man
How to win wars and alienate citizens.
“I didn’t want America to feel like they had to do it by themselves“, the words of Tony Blair as part of his testimony to The Chilcot Inquiry into the Iraq War.
Duh, if someone’s going to do something bad you’re supposed to stop them! Not fall behind a dumb plan, conceived by a dumb President, to convince a great country that he is looking after their interests!
Whilst Mr Blair didn’t really get flustered during what was supposed to be his day of reckoning, much of his reasoning leaves a lot to be desired. The thought processes are lacking substance in a lot of the issues he spoke about. Given he is such an intelligent man. The only good thing I took away from his testimony is that he didn’t apologise and has no regrets. I really dislike people who say sorry after the fact and the un-reversible deed has already been done. If nothing else at least he didn’t stoop that low.
In the meantime George W. Bush can rest easy knowing that he has once again pwn3d Mr Blair! It’d be funny if it wasn’t so serious.
Polanski finally gets his comeuppance
So Roman Polanski finally got arrested for “unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor“, relating to his guilty plea in 1978. Yes that’s right, an acclaimed and award winning film director evaded justice for more than thirty years, whilst the establishment looked on and still revered him. The minor involved if you don’t know, was a thirteen year old at the time who trusted him to photograph her for Vogue. Classic paedophile trap.
In the 30 years he has evaded justice he has jetted around the world doing as he pleases save for going to the US from where he skipped bail. What I find particularly galling is the way people in the industry and society have seemingly looked the other way and forgot about the fact he is a convicted sexual offender.
Society has a tendency to do this in cases where it is quite obvious that someone has being wronged in a serious and amoral way. The only requirement that we forget all about it is that the perpetrator has to somehow have previously in some way. It’s unforgivable on our part as a society that we can let injustices lay like that. Sometimes I feel embarrassed for the sake of future generations. They will look back and wonder how we ever lived with a clear conscience through this and other even more serious injustices, which we have done nothing about.
How many Postmen want their kids to be Postmen?
Sorting office - Jobs worth striking for!
I absolutely hope the answer to the title question is none or at least not many. However the way the Communication Workers’ Union (CWU) is carrying on you’d think that working in a sorting office is a job worth aspiring to. Don’t get me wrong (yeah this is the bit where I say some unpalatable things) because being a postman or working in a sorting office is not a bad thing in itself.
People’s situations vary and of course there are many reasons why someone would be working there, but one thing I can say is that I look down upon anyone who works there and doesn’t aspire for more. Either for themself or their family. Themself because if you’re not working there to better yourself then I really hope you’re doing it to elevate your family. Note that I used the word elevate, by which I mean those workers shouldn’t just be looking to feed their families. There’s more to life than food. Really there is.
Anyway, the gist of the strike if you don’t know or are working in a sorting office (in which case you don’t know) is that the Royal Mail wants to modernise. In 2007 they rolled out a four phase plan to help achieve that modernisation, which the CWU agreed to. I’m not sure why they couldn’t have five phases as it’s common knowledge that all good plans either run for five years or have five phases!
Fast forward to 2009 and they have surprisingly implemented three of those phases save for the last one which calls for rolling out a ‘walk sequencing machine, a device which organises letters into the order the postmen and women will deliver them the next morning.’ A pretty neat idea which to my untrained ear says ‘lower costs, efficiency, speed’ and all the good things that any decent business and it’s customers should hope for. Of course it probably means many jobs in the sorting office will be lost, but hey who wants to haggle over menial jobs being lost? Oh……. the CWU?
The situation would be really funny to me if people’s skilled jobs didn’t rely on the Royal Mail. Losing professional jobs is one thing. But sorters *%?!! This really takes the biscuit. The CWU wants to save menial jobs even though surely the modernisation will result in skilled jobs being created. Granted there’ll be fewer than the lost ones, but hey who really wants their kids to grow up to be Post Men?
A truly hazardous profession.
let the bankers get their money
Cut the bankers some slack. Greed is good.
I’ve just been reading about George Osborne (the opposition Conservative's Shadow Chancellor) statements about how bankers' large pay awards were "unacceptable" for any bank backed by state guarantees. I was stumped once again because I’ve heard this before from him, the press and the Man On The Street.
The Conservatives are making some mistakes on their journey to government. They'll get there despite themselves and because of Labour's ineptitude. However, this banker's pay issue is not going to be responsible for the Conservatives attracting voters and as such they should just stop taking vote-buying stances like these. The public is disillusioned by the banking sector, amongst other things, but thems the times we live in. All of a sudden the Man On The Street is not talking about Osama Bin-Laden, Kandahar and the Tora-Bora mountains, but about quantitative easing and the stimulus package. This doesn’t mean the Man On The Street is adequately informed as I’m about to point out.
For me to believe that the self-appointed party of business is sincere in not wanting the banks to issue big bonuses is quite hard. Why? Because we have to look at what a bonus is in the first instance for us to think about whether or not the practise is a good idea. By definition a bonus is a reward for greater than expected performance. Success, in other words. Anyone who owns a business should be glad if they have to pay out a bonus. Simply put it means that things are going well and that the people responsible are being rewarded for helping to bring about that success. By extension large bonuses are probably a result of big success. I hear that HSBC delivered almost £200,000 in net earnings per head in their investment banking arm the other week. That was just for one quarter by the way. Stunning.
The only issue we should be arguing about is how bonuses are structured. Fred Wilson on AVC.com touched on it some time ago, though I didn't agree with all his points. Among the contentious issues I'm against that he pointed out are;
- Guaranteed bonuses - This, I believe, was a big part of banking remuneration practise prior to the crisis. Guaranteed bonuses are not in anyone's interest other than the person receiving them. No company has any business guaranteeing a bonus, though I understand the thinking behind it.
- Contractual obligations - "all bonuses should, at the end of the day, be subject to board and compensation committee approval (even if the goals that trigger the bonuses have been met). The board has a fiduciary responsibility to look after the stockholders first and foremost. If paying the bonuses (even if they have been earned) puts the company in trouble, then there needs to be a mechanism for the board to avoid paying them. Compensation committee and board approval does that." Where the compensation committee has approved remuneration they should not however, backtrack as happened with RBS and their former CEO.
Having taken into account the above two scenarios I believe bankers (and any other worker) must be given whatever bonuses their success dictates. If that bonus is large and based on a percentage of the business they've brought in, so be it. The bonus just has to be measurable and the business they've bought in, traceable.
Mr Osborne thinking that large bonuses are a bad thing is just something I can’t buy into. Maybe his, the Man On The Street and the press’ sentiments are driven by the prevailing economic crisis, but I think that it’s misguided and an over-reaction. On the contrary, some of these troubled banks like Northern Rock and Lloyds could do with attracting as much top talent as they can to get them out of the messes they’re in. How do you think they can do that?
Of course the Man On The Street is also a voter (probably a former Labour one at that) and thus Mr Osborne wants to be on his side. But hey, I believe voters are a stupid bunch anyway. Mr Osborne doesn’t need to placate them by giving them the bankers’ heads when he may just need those same bankers if he gets to government.
