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(108,903 posts) Tue Mar 5, 2013, 09:07 AM Mar 2013

Sh*t CEOs Say: 6 Outrageous Statements from America's Big-Mouthed Overlords

http://www.alternet.org/economy/sht-ceos-say-6-outrageous-statements-americas-big-mouthed-overlords

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1. “That's why I'm richer than you.”

JPMorgan honcho Jamie Dimon has taken time out of his regularly scheduled program of mismanaging a systemically dangerous bank to divulge why he's richer than the rest of us. Last week, Mike Mayo, who is both an analyst at CLSA and a critic of too-big-to-fail banks, was on an investor conference call -- a forum in which executives typically offer BS about their company’s performance. Mayo wasn’t having it. He asked pointedly if customers might take their money to better-capitalized banks than JPMorgan. ( Check out the video.)

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2. “I don’t think that I would consider myself a feminist.”

Marissa Mayer, who recently became the CEO of Yahoo, catapulted to meme-of-the-moment when she decided, in a burst of anachronistic bone-headedness, that employees may no longer telecommute, but must stay chained to their desks five days a week.

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3. “We have a right to make a profit.”

Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan is no stranger to controversy, having amplified his bank’s bad vibes in 2011 with an infamous $5 debit card fee that fizzled in the face of widespread criticism. The BofA chief whined that this was all grossly unfair, insisting that his company had a "right to make a profit" and that nobody understood "how much good" his employees do.

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4. “We've got to get companies to regulate themselves…”

Of all the idiotic ideas we’ve heard since the financial crisis, this notion ranks high for sheer brazenness. And who uttered these words? None other than AIG CEO Robert Benmosche, whose company became the poster child for the culture of corporate dysfunction that helped tank the economy. AIG got a $180 billion bailout during the 2008 financial crisis, which it needed in part because financial institutions had been allowed to regulate themselves.