Throughout the Republican and Democratic conventions, the theme of success was touched upon. Republicans went to great lengths to paint President Obama as someone who was denigrating “success” and the Democrats countered by simply reassuring the American public, contrary to what Republicans are saying, they admired success as well.
A childish back-and-forth, to say the least, and one that altogether misses the point. It is a flawed framing of an argument to reduce it to something as inane as are you for or against success. Once again, it appears we are having the wrong discussion; we are asking the wrong question.
Mitt Romney found himself having to defend his record at Bain and in somewhat of a pickle in that he did not have a particularly good explanation as to why he hadn’t released more years of his income tax returns. And so this diversionary maneuver was employed so that anyone who challenged him on such things was personally attacking his success and disparaging success in general.
Nonetheless, the GOP opened the door to a much needed discourse about what Dr. King prophetically called a radical revolution of values — especially in light of the seeming absence of values that led us into the economic abyss we have yet to emerge from.
And the plunge into that abyss was brought to us, by-and-large, by the Wall Street and private equity clan whose actions and methods the GOP are hoping to deflect criticism from by using the attacking success line. A true dialogue could have materialized out of this erroneous political rationale, but, as seems to be the case far too many times, the Democrats and the media bit on the diversion.
So now we are left with this dichotomous debate which only serves to distract us from the real issue, which is: How do we as a society define success? Or more pointedly, what do we value most? From the time the GOP presidential candidate introduced this as a line of attack (or deflection), it seems that the two parties have been locked into this surreal conflict.
What we are being told, in a sense, is that if one doesn’t accept an extremely limited and condescendingly exclusive definition of success, then they are, in turn, attacking success. The scope of what success seems to be, in the minds of some, is confined to a small sliver of millionaires and billionaires, to the CEOs of corporate and Wall Street empires.
The worship of riches and the demonization of the American worker
The belief and notion that the accumulation of wealth is, in and itself, a sign of success isn’t just problematic from some sort of lofty or esoteric viewpoint, but from a simple, practical, fiscal bottom-line perspective as well. For example, compensation to the best-paid CEOs at the largest U.S.-based financial companies collectively rose by an average of 20.4 percent in 2011, according to a new report from Bloomberg Markets magazine.
But, here’s the problem: 33 of the 50 biggest financial companies had negative share returns in their 2011 fiscal years. Now, we are told that these CEO’s are being paid “market value” or “what the market will bear,” and yet, could any other sphere of work so blatantly fall short of its own rubric for “success” and still be so amply rewarded?
And while this ascendancy of the finance-sector ruling class was taking place, it was coupled with a strategic and sustained defamation campaign against, once highly esteemed (and highly unionized), occupations such as law enforcement, firefighters and teachers.
Over the past few years, the claim has been made by state and local governments about being bankrupted by high-paid public employees, their pensions and their unions. This tactic has been largely successful in painting public sector employees as bloated leeches sucking the economic lifeblood out of municipalities across the nation.
A Pew Research Center survey from February of 2011 found that the same percentage of Americans — 48 percent — view both public and private unions favorably. Forty percent of those surveyed viewed public unions unfavorably, while 37 percent viewed private unions unfavorably —- those are significant unfavorable percentages.
And those negative perceptions have been used to great effect. In places such as Indiana, Wisconsin, Maine, Florida and Ohio, governors and state legislators have passed unprecedented anti-collective bargaining legislation and except for some notable exceptions in Ohio and Wisconsin, there was very little pushback by the public.
Public workers fighting for themselves
While the Occupy movement may have shined a glaring spotlight on income inequality and salary disparities, it hasn’t moved the needle much on the popularity meter for public sector unions. The vilified and demonized firefighter, law enforcement officer and public school teacher are, essentially, left to fend for themselves, and, for the most part, left to plead their own case.
The successful raiding of the state and local economies by unions betrays the reality of the lives of many of those workers, however. The Center for Housing Policy in a study titled “Paycheck to Paycheck,” addressed the inability of some of those, perceived, union ne’er do wells, in finding affordable housing.
Some of the same blocks, which police officers patrol and many of the homes that firefighters are called upon to protect, are, for them, unaffordable (or near unaffordable) blocks to live on and houses to live in. The metro median salary for a police officer is about $50,000 and the income needed to purchase a home is approximately $46,000 a year. When other factors are included — children, family expenses, etc. — that $4,000 cushion begins to look insufficient.
Conversely, a firefighter, on average, earns about $42,000 a year and that falls painfully short of the aforementioned $46,000 figure needed to purchase a home. But we are led to believe they are the problem.
Yes one can look at public education, law enforcement and other public sector fields and see certain failings and abuses, but does that disqualify the professions as a whole? And if it does, why isn’t that same standard applied to corporate CEOs and Wall Street executives?
The irony of all this, is that many of the shortfalls that occurred in state and local budgets (that this disdain for public employees is based upon) was caused by the Great Recession, brought to us courtesy of those very successful captains of the financial industry.
So to simply question this injustice is an attack; to demand greater accountability and equity is the “politics of envy.” We only wish we had it as good as the wealthy and the powerful, they insinuate, and if we could have what they have we would comport ourselves in the same manner.
And so the teacher who retires near penniless, and yet helped launch and shape the lives of scores of individuals brimming with purpose and character, according to the pseudo-debate we are engaged in, should be considered less than successful.
The young lady’s life torn apart by abuse and degradation that comes through it all with her dignity and spirit intact, and goes on to become a source of strength for others … absent of a large bank account, can’t rightly be called a success.
Defining success in America: The disparity between rich and poor
This isn’t meandering conjecture but rather an attempt to raise the question that was introduced near the onset: How do we as a society define success?
Have we considered that the very things that are used to define the average person’s life as a failure are the very things that do virtually nothing to impede the view of the wealthy as successful?
Let’s take bankruptcy for example. There are many low and middle income people who can’t find decent housing or are eliminated from certain jobs because of a bankruptcy. Yet, Donald Trump’s corporations (he has never personally filed) have filed for bankruptcy four times. Trump, essentially, has come to epitomize success in the eyes of many, but ask yourself, would society be as kind to you if you found yourself in similar circumstances?
In light of how much the deficit and debt is being discussed by the GOP ticket, it is a curious set of circumstances that makes the centerpiece of Mitt Romney’s argument for the presidency his experience at the private equity firm Bain Capital. You see, contrary to the rather rosy picture being painted currently, private equity firms are not in the business of turning around companies and creating jobs.
One of the more common practices of private equity is to borrow money against the assets of the companies in their crosshairs – this happens before the PE firm owns the companies, by the way. Paradoxically, the debt that Romney seems to find so abhorrent when it comes to the federal government, is a key component in “successful” private equity firms such as Bain.
PE firms take out enormous bank loans and use them to acquire existing firms, liquidating every asset it can and saddles the target companies with the debt. The solvency of the targeted companies is not the main priority; the retaining of employees and jobs are not a chief concern, and legally speaking, that’s fine.
Their primary goal and function is to make a profit for their investors and for the private equity firm, once again, it’s perfectly legal. Nevertheless, are those in this very exclusive community, with very narrow and self-serving objectives, to be the standard-bearers for success for the larger, broader society? Further, to decry debt when it comes to public policy while using it to accumulate your personal wealth, smacks of blatant hypocrisy.
If the average individual was repeatedly fined or penalized for a crime or infraction, they would, at best, be called dishonest and, at worst, a career criminal. When those same transgressions are committed by the wealthy and well-connected, it barely raises an eyebrow; when corporations and firms engage in such practices it is merely the price of doing business.
British pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline agreed to plead guilty to criminal charges and pay $3 billion in fines for promoting its best-selling antidepressants for unapproved uses and failing to report safety data about a top diabetes drug, in July of this year. The agreement also includes civil penalties for improper marketing of a half-dozen other drugs.
Additionally, in May, Abbott Laboratories settled for $1.6 billion over its marketing of the anti-seizure drug Depakote. And an agreement with Johnson & Johnson that could result in a fine of as much as $2 billion is said to be imminent over its off-label promotion of an antipsychotic drug, Risperdal.
Yet, no individuals have been charged in any of these cases. You can be sure that GlaxoSmithKline is still considered a success, but the question is, could Jane or Joe Citizen survive such a mark against their reputation?
Lastly, could any typical American, in a sense, burn the company they run to the ground and hope to gain a hefty severance package? The rational and reasonable mind has to say no, but those deemed successful (corporate America and Wall Street) appear able to do so.
Let’s go down the list as outlined by NYT article from September 2011:
Robert Kelly received $17.2 million in severance after being ousted from the CEO job at Bank of New York Mellon last month.
Carol Bartz left Yahoo with nearly $10 million in cash and stock options after being fired from the top job at The Daily Ticker’s parent company.
John Chidsey received almost $20 million from Burger King when he left in April.
Baxter Phillips was awarded nearly $14 million after his company, Massey Energy, was sold to Alpha Natural Resources in June.
Ian McCarthy walked away from Beazer Homes with about $6.3 million in severance, even after being forced to repay his original package after the company settled with the SEC for filling misleading statements. Beazer even reimbursed McCarthy for up to $10,000 in legal fees.
Time and space doesn’t allow for all the names and examples of this sort of ineptitude, but I believe you get the picture. This is the success that we are told we are envious of; this is the “achievement” that we are accused of attacking any time we call in to question suspect practices and seek fairness in our economic policies.
No, not all public employees possess halos and wings; nor do all those in corporate America and Wall Street own a personal pair of horns and a pitchfork, but it’s clear to see in what direction the playing field is tilted.
It seems that it hasn’t been enough for the corporate and economic lords of the manor to receive exorbitant salaries, compensation packages and golden parachutes —- even when it’s at the expense of the companies they served and the companies they targeted. It appears that they will not be satisfied until they have our admiration and worship as well.
In order to narrowly define success in purely economic terms, greed and excess must be sanctified. How successful the propagators of such a doctrine actually are, depends on how insistent we are, as a society, to engage in that right and just radical revolution of values.