Here's comes Hillary's economic populism...diagnosis, but no prescription

[bigtree]

Washington Post ‏@washingtonpost 7m7 minutes ago
Hillary Clinton calls out CEOs for making too much money http://wapo.st/1DYXDnM

We have our first indicator of how much of a populist Hillary Rodham Clinton will be in her presidential campaign. In a message to supporters on Sunday, she observed that "the average CEO makes about 300 times what the average worker makes" while many American families are still having a hard time getting by, Reuters reports.

That statistic is accurate. The difference between executive and average-worker compensation is about twice as large as it is in places like Switzerland and Germany, where CEO compensation is already very high compared to the rest of the world, as Wonkblog has reported previously. What's more, the gap in the United States is about ten times as large as most Americans realize...

The largest source of the recent increase in inequality of income appears to be that investors are getting larger returns, according to the Congressional Research Service. Some of those investors are CEOs who are being paid in stock rather than cash, partly as a result of several decisions by Congress about how investors and corporations are taxed. When executives are taxed at a lower rate, for example, they have more of a financial reason to demand as much as they can get out of a corporate board of directors.

If Clinton doesn't talk about raising the tax on capital gains or something similarly concrete, she might not be able to convince liberal Democrats she's serious about addressing inequality of income. On the other hand, that kind of proposal would be more controversial among moderates.


read: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/04/14/wonkbook-clinton-calls-out-ceos-for-making-too-much-money/?tid=sm_tw

[mmonk]

1. Yep.

[cali]

2. Yes. That's it in a nutshell.

[djean111]

3. Hey, guys, there will be "conversations". That's about it.

She is beholden to those CEOs.

[hatrack]

5. What about a "National Conversation"?

We can still have one of those, can't we? Please!!??!

[djean111]

6. Maybe we can all tweet at the same time!!!!!!

Um, I don't think the likes of us will be included in any conversations.
And, of course, if HRC is nominated, and wins, we will be loftily told that hey, we voted for her.

[OKNancy]

4. These writers need to do their homework....

Some writers and some here think all this is new for Hillary. It is not.


Hillary Clinton on Corporations : Jun 20, 2007
Enough with corporate welfare; enough with golden parachutes

Let’s finally do something about the growing economic inequality that is tearing our country apart. The top 1% of our households hold 22% of our nation’s wealth. That is the highest concentration of wealth in a very small number of people since 1929. So let’s close that gap. Let’s start holding corporate America responsible, make them pay their fair share again. Enough with the corporate welfare. Enough with the golden parachutes. And enough with the tax incentives for companies to shift jobs overseas.

http://www.ontheissues.org/News_Corporate_Welfare.htm


----------------
Reich was ... gladdened by Hillary's passionate condemnation of corporate-executive compensation—one of the Labor Secretary's favorite populist topics. "These are real issues, Bill," she said, pointing out that the average CEO of a big company "is now earning 200 times the average hourly wage. Twenty years ago the ratio was about forty times ... People all over this country are really upset about this." When Bill demurred, saying he couldn't be "out front" on such issues, Hillary said sharply, "Well, somebody in the administration ought to be making these arguments," turning to Reich. "I agree," replied Bill with a nod.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/chatterbox/2007/10/robert_reich_new_best_friend_to_ceos.html

---
"We need to open up CEO compensation to public scrutiny and public challenge and ensure that boards of directors are independent when determining CEO pay."

May 2007

[cascadiance]

7. Then she should retract her support for corporate elite serving H-1B program expansion...

... which really doesn't serve either American workers or those that are brought in as indentured servants from other countries to cheapen labor world wide and redistribute those wages upward to the elites.

And even Indian workers have shown that they resent how this program works as well, as shown in this report done in the bay area recently about "body shops" exploiting H-1B program.

http://www.nbcbayarea.com/investigations/Silicon-Valleys-Body-Shop-Secret-280567322.html

You can't just selectively pick out certain quotes of Hillary Clinton's to make it sound like she works for American labor, when there are examples of how she's worked against it, that she's not "made right" by showing any kind of realization publicly that she was WRONG in instances like this.

[OKNancy]

8. I can pick out quotes about the subject matter of the OP

which was about CEO compensation.

[cascadiance]

10. Which goes up when mechanisms are in place to push the rest of our salaries down...

... which is PRECISELY what H-1B does!

[merrily]

9. No campaign rhetoric should trump a lifetime of acts and omissions.

For the six years between 1986 and 1992, while Bill was in the Governor's mansion until before he became President:

Fellow board members and company executives, who have not spoken publicly about her role at Wal-Mart, say Mrs. Clinton used her position to champion personal causes, like the need for more women in management and a comprehensive environmental program, despite being Wal-Mart’s only female director, the youngest and arguably the least experienced in business. On other topics, like Wal-Mart’s vehement anti-unionism, for example, she was largely silent, they said.

,,,,,

Despite her criticism, Mrs. Clinton maintains close ties to Wal-Mart executives through the Democratic Party and the tightly knit Arkansas business community. Her husband, former President Bill Clinton, speaks frequently to Wal-Mart’s current chief executive, H. Lee Scott Jr., about issues like health care and even played host to Mr. Scott at the Clintons’ home in New York last July for a private dinner.

And several months ago, Mrs. Clinton helped broker a secret meeting between a top Wal-Mart executive and former Democratic operative, Leslie Dach, and leaders of the retailer’s longtime adversary at the United Food and Commercial Workers union, according to several people briefed on the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to do so publicly.

The goal of the meeting was to tamp down the rancor between the company and the union, which has set up a group, WakeUpWalMart.com, that has harshly criticized the chain and leaked embarrassing internal documents to the news media, though an accord has not yet been reached.

much more

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/20/us/politics/20walmart.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0


That speaks volumes to me. What she says about income inequality after hiring 200+ very well to do economic advisors will not. Especially since

One of Mrs. Clinton’s broader goals is to develop ways to address economic anxiety without sounding like a combative populist or demonizing high-income groups, said a person familiar with her thinking [/blockquote}

http://www.wsj.com/articles/clinton-consults-experts-to-define-economic-pitch-1422837490


Please note, her goal is to "address" economic "anxiety" (not "economic injustice" or "economic inequality," or "income inequality," but an emotional psychiatric disorder.)

And heaven forbid anyone sound like "combative populist." I mean, really, why would any populist be combative? All the silent polite populists are just getting stuff handed to them, left and right, right?

Okay, I get it. The 99% are suffering from economic anxiety not economic injustice. They are also needlessly combative and are demonizers of the 1%. Now, let's see. What faults and wrongs did this person familiar with Hillary's thinking attributed to the 1%. What is it her goal to do about them?

Hey! Wait a minute........