Hollywood Hypocrisy

Yesterday I was thinking about how the Bush Administration has made so many of its cronies very rich as a by-product of their domestic and foreign policy especially regarding the oil and armaments industries. I checked the price of Haliburton, Dick Cheney's former company. He was the CEO of Haliburton before he became Vice President. The value of his stock options have increased astronomically since 2001. They are now estimated to be worth nearly $20,000,000. I am sure this is not a big surprise to those who are aware of the excessive compensation given to corporate executives today. The average salary of corporate executives is many times greater than the rank and file workers. But, this inequity applies equally to the sports and entertainment people who are making salaries that are perhaps more obscene.

The April 10, 2006 Wall Street Journal had an article in it called: Studios Are Furious That SEC Is Curious About Hollywood Pay by MATTHEW KARNITSCHNIG, MERISSA MARR and KARA SCANNELL. You can find it here. Here are some quotes from the article that are significant:

Media companies, worried that some of their most closely guarded Hollywood secrets could be exposed, are rallying to fight a proposed change to corporate-disclosure rules.The proposed regulation, under consideration by the Securities and Exchange Commission, would require a corporation to publish the salary details of as many as three nonexecutive employees whose total compensation exceeds that of any of its top five officers. Companies currently have to disclose only the pay of the chief executive officer and the next four highest-paid officers.

Nowhere are stars with huge paychecks more plentiful than in entertainment. But despite the industry's reputation for flaunting wealth, detailed information on the compensation of a big-name entertainment figure is rare. In addition to a salary, top earners often receive bonuses, stock and perquisites -- extras that are usually protected by extensive confidentiality clauses in contracts.

The people in the entertainment and sports business are the most blatantly self promotional people in the world. And they seem to only care about their own projects. Each day you see them on the talk shows promoting movies that many of them are making mega millions of dollars. I realize that some of these people are very talented in their chosen profession, but do they ever think about the vast inequity there is in the salaries they are receiving? Perhaps they do not realize that these excessive salaries are causing rank and file workers from receiving a fair piece of the corporate pie. Rather than worry about illegal immigrants as the reason for salaries being so low, we should focus on the vast inequities of compensation in America in all professions. Would it be so horrible if Tom Cruise made $10,000,000 on a movie instead of $20,000,000 plus a percentage of the profits? And wouldn't it be nice if those benefits would go to the hard working people who work for the studios at a small fraction of Cruise's compensation.

This Wall Street Journal article points out that the excessive compensation issue is not only a result of high executive compensation. The fact is that many non executives in the entertainment business are as much a part of the problem as corporate executives, especially those in the MSM. The many Hollywood liberals who make these vast sums of money from the MSM companies that they so often crticize should take a look in the mirror to find out where the problem lies. This unabated desire for wealth accumulation is a game that has to stop for there to be a reasonable chance for working class America to rise to the standard of living they deserve.

The SEC is right in my opinion to have the non executive compensation of the media companies and Hollywood studios be disclosed. If that information were disclosed, it would point out the hypocracy of those who just criticize the corporate executives. At least public companies have to disclose by law the excessive compensation made by these corporate executives. If these Hollywood liberals really want to change the culture in America, perhaps they should put their money where their mouths are. And please don't tell me how generous these Hollywood liberals are with their own favorite charities. I would like their favorite charity to be the working man of America and stop the insane desire for wealth accumulation.