So, if I can give a speech to a Wall Street Brokerage firm for $250,000, why should you care?

[sarabelle]

Go give a speech.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

1. Okay. nt

[zipplewrath]

2. What did you say?

Did you tell them what great people they were?

[marylandblue]

3. Nobody is really worth $250,000 for a speech.

It's a way for high level politicians to monetize their fame and access.

[OnDoutside]

5. You're worth what people are willing to pay. Top soccer players in the UK can get 400K a week.

[marylandblue]

9. Yeah, theoretical, but, in practice, not really.

Goldman Sachs decides what to pay. It is an investment bank. The make huge fees and/or profits from IPOs and other financial transactions. The fees are negotiated between Goldman Sachs and the original investors in the company. The people who negotiate the fees and stock prices are investors who make huge amounts money when the company goes public. When the company goes public, stock fundd individual investors buy the stock, giving profit to the original investors and Goldman Sachs who decided the fees for their own profit, not the stock buyers and they keep this transaction as opaque as possible. And IPOs are just one way they do this. There are all sorts of shadow banking transactions they make money on.

In theory everybody all agreed to this and knows how this works, but in practice, it is all very opaque and people would be shocked how these companies are skimming billions from the market. These sort of opaque transactions caused the 2008 crash, that the public paid for, so that Goldman Sachs could keep the profits. Before the banks figured out how to do this in the 1980s, they didn't make nearly as much money, but the value added of banking wasn't much different.

This is why traditional capitalism doesn't really work anymore. One person gets $250,000 an hour to tell rich people what they want to hear, while another person gets $7.50 an hour to empty their garbage cans. Without knowing it, you pay both those people. I don't mind paying $15.00 for their janitors, but I do mind paying $250,000 for their egos to be stroked.

Warren, Sanders, Buttigieg et al are right that this needs to change, which requires understanding how people game the current system for obscene profits.

[myohmy2]

23. thank you...

...

[delisen]

29. what if they tell rich people hat they don't want to hear

and donate the money to charity.

Same with best selling books?

[customerserviceguy]

11. Apples and oranges

A soccer player works their butt off, and risks physical injury in aggressively playing the game. About the worst thing that can happen to a speaker is a sudden, unexplained bout of stage fright.

Also, any highly paid athlete (or other entertainer) generates revenue from their performance that makes it worthwhile for some person or organization to pay them so much. I guess you could argue that the political speaker makes it worthwhile to pay vast sums of money to, but you then are left to wonder how much of the "service" provided is outside of the speech, and just what that consists of.

[OnDoutside]

13. Well I'd pay good money to hear Mueller sing like a canary ! Even now, President Obama can pull in

top dollar, yet is out of the power position.

[customerserviceguy]

14. With a House subpoena

we should be able to hear Mueller for a mere pittance.

And don't think that Barack Obama is without influence, both domestically and internationally just because he's no longer president. I'm not saying that the former President is selling his influence, but he is perceived as still having quite a bit of it.

[stopdiggin]

12. nobody's worth?

Might be walking out on to thin ice here. Economics was NOT my favorite subject in school.

But .. I've always felt REAL skeptical about arguments to the effect, "Nobody is worth ..."
Says who? Yes, there is the appeal to common sense but ... Who is to be the arbiter of such things?
So .. if the school board doesn't want to give the teachers a pay raise .. then, end of argument, that's what the teachers are worth?

It seems a very sticky wicket. And, like I said I'm NOT the most qualified by far ..

[marylandblue]

16. Yes, the classical economics argument is that we are all rational actors

in a free and open market decide so the actual price is the best estimate of real value. But there are all sorts of assumptions that often are untrue in the real world, so practical application can be quite limited.

So just because you can get $250,000 per hour doesn't mean you are really worth if you had to market your speaking services in a free market based on rational factors.

And if you are actually worth that much, what exactly are they paying for? Is it really information they could not have gotten from someone else, or is some other kind of benefit which perhaps consists of "non-market services?"

[pnwmom]

19. Oh yeah? A single ticket to Springsteen's broadway show cost as much as $42K.

How much do you think he made for each performance?

https://www.wsj.com/articles/want-top-tickets-to-the-bosss-final-bow-on-broadway-it-may-cost-you-42-511-11544636667

Bruce Springsteen may have built his career singing songs about working-class life. But if you want to catch a final performance of the New Jersey rocker’s perennially sold-out Broadway show, be prepared to pay anything but blue-collar prices.

[marylandblue]

21. If I had that kind of money, I would certainly pay $42,000 for Springsteen tickets rather than

listen to a politician talk.

The Springsteen tickets probably are using dynamic pricing, where ticket prices increase depending on demand. But that's not so terrible since it matches the assumption of a free market, many buyers and many sellers making rational choices with their own money. Many people want to see Springsteen of course because of his special talent, but they also have many other entertainment options which cost much less. And a live concert is better than a recording, so it's not like you could get this experience at home.

But tickets for those politician speeches at Goldman Sachs are not like that. A select few influential politicians command top dollar to speak at select venues. To do what exactly? What secrets does the politician have that Goldman Sachs employees need to here? Why is the politician's knowledge and fame, made possible by a public trust, being sold for private gain? Does the politician really know anything more than what a regular economics professor knows? Theoretically there is some value here, but realistically, we know the $250,000 isn't for any special knowledge. It isn't for the speech. It's a bribe. A small price for Goldman Sachs, that pays off in political connections and a favorable word here or there. Our system doesn't know what to do with this. It's not a quid pro quo,so technically legal, but it's really not an honest transaction either.

[pnwmom]

22. So? The fact is people pay to hear famous people and watch famous people.

And $200K for a speech isn't out of line with other people who are exercising their vocal cords.

[marylandblue]

24. It's effectively a legal bribe. It would be illegal if they took it in office.

But every politician knows that lucrative speaking fees, corporate board memberships or lobbying jobs are waiting for them whenever they leave office. They could be the most boring no talent hack in the world, but they write their own ticket when they leave.

[pnwmom]

25. And that's why it's not legal for Senators and Representatives to give paid speeches.

But people who are out of government are allowed to make a living.

[marylandblue]

30. So if I knew the briber would pay me millions after I left office, that's perfectly okay.

The law says it is, but do you really believe that has no influence on decision making? What about later on, when I have many friends in government, and they pay me for a speech at the same time they are pushing certain legislation. Do they think I don't get the message?

It's okay for them to make a very good living, but there needs to be lifetime limits on this practice to avoid the appearance of impropriety. The appearance may not be in your eyes, but many people do think it's a problem.

[CentralMass]

7. Are you going to run for President?

[handmade34]

8. unfortunately

too many of us make excuses for our causes...

[customerserviceguy]

10. The first $10,000 of that

is probably a suitable honorarium for a significantly prominent person who can give $10K of usable advice to an audience that can appreciate the speaker's perspective, which may be quite different from those of most of the listeners.

The rest looks like a bribe.

[RANDYWILDMAN]

15. They are clearing buying you....

The payback comes later when they need a tax break or bailout so they can keep profiting of these backs of most of the little people.

EX. Remember that a bank like wall street, Goldman sachs made 36 billion last year, so throwing you 250 thou is like throwing you a nickel. Yes you got paid, but they are getting back a ton more then they gave you.

It's a scale of worth you are higher then the peons for now, as long as you have something to help them out with, when you get old or disagree I bet the start funding someone else's speeches.......




Minimum wage is a disgusting term, it should be outlawed.Maximum wage is ok though.

[seaglass]

17. When I worked for AmEx we always had a high level keynote speaker at our annual manager's meeting

and I'm sure they got paid very well. I remember someone speaking from Enron who put me to sleep (this was when supposedly Enron was the next best thing lol).

Bill Cosby, Norman Schwarzkopf, Ann Richards all spoke at our meetings. Lots of companies do this and there's nothing wrong with it.

[athena]

18. Do you know how much a top hedge fund manager makes per hour?

I only have the numbers from a few years ago. It was over $400,000 an hour on average for the CEOs of the top 25 hedge funds.

You read that correctly: over $400,000 per hour. Assuming a forty-hour work week and fifty work weeks a year (i.e., no vacations), these men (and they were all men) made more per hour than most people you know make in a year.

So I’m sorry, but the enemy is not Hillary or any other politician who gives a $250,000 speech, which probably took many hours to prepare. If you really care about income inequality, first understand what the pay scales are at the top of the financial totem pole.

Today, I tried to see the Egyptian tomb at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I couldn’t really feel the atmosphere, though, because it was being prepared by museum staff for an event that some gazillionnaire probably paid the Met a few million dollars (i.e., pocket change) for. We live in a very unequal society, and it all depends on the people at the bottom not knowing just how unequal it really is.

[pecosbob]

20. I say knock yourself out

But I also say the IRS should take about 75K of that check. We could easily finance universal healthcare and a properly funded educational system if the rich would just pay their share. The one percent are living in a Randian fantasy which cannot last.

[DetlefK]

26. Some person in the company happens to decide that you are worth $250,000 of company-money?

Would this person pay you $250,000 if it were their own money?

[DFW]

27. I don't care

To me, it's the difference between listening to a Rolling Stones CD and seeing them live. They play soccer stadiums and take in millions every night from 50,000 people who could just as easily have stayed home, put on a Stones CD and ordered a pizza for a lot less money. If people are willing to pay for that kind of thing, that's their business. Modern-day Beatlemania to me.

[Kurt V.]

28. at some point in the not so distant future we're going to have to recalibrate to concept of human

worth. some ppl are deemed completely disposable for the crime of being born.