Carly's Corporate Welfare

Many conservatives eagerly bash welfare. Curiously, corporate executives and boards are big fans. To wit:

Carly Fiorina was recently fired from HP. Presumably the board was not happy with her performance. After being told to clean out her desk, she was escorted to the door by armed guards. But unlike when you or I get fired, the guards escorting Carly were carrying her bags of money:


- Severance package of 2 1/2 timers her salary -- $14 million in cash, payable within six months.

- $7.4 million as part of a performance incentive program

- An extra $1 million early last year as part of a performance plan for executives.

- Another bonus of $567,000.

- $50,000 for financial counseling

- She also gets to keep her computer equipment

- "technical support" for three months

- administrative support for six months

- maintenance on her home security for a year


Now if this isn't corporate welfare, I don't know what is. If she was performing so poorly, why all the bonuses? Is $14M not enough to buy an HP computer with 3 month technical support? Maybe that would be a clue to why HP's not selling many computers.

Numbers from:
http://www.dhonline.com/articles/2005/02/15/news/opinion/edit01.txt

Bush Should Show Faith in His Own Program

In order for George Bush to show the viability of his Social Security Initiative, I propose that he lead by example.

Every president receives a $400,000 per year lifetime stipend. If George believes so strongly in the "Ownership Society", then he should agree to "investing" the same portion of his future proceeds as he's asking Americans to invest theirs.

As Mr. Bush is already a millionaire and very likely to remain one for the rest of his life, this action would be purely symbolic. It would however demonstrate one aspect of leadership: not asking your troops to do anything you wouldn't do yourself.