1923 Making Out

Sometimes you gotta feel sorry for Big Banker CEO types. They just make one mistake and all of a sudden their boards slash their pay.
Now I'm not talking about local bankers, whose stewardship of client funds is well respected. Nor local banks themselves, which do wonders for their local communities by reinvesting money in them.
I'm talking about those really big guys who seem a little out of touch with the struggles of common folks. It's funny; they've been known to call themselves "makers." And the common folk "takers."
Even though some makers made it by taking from the supposed takers. Reference the 401K exploding financial crater of 2008.
In any event, you'd think the taker-makers would have learned a thing or two about risky investments and the consequences thereof. And their boards something about penalties for that behavior. Apparently not so much.
CEO Jamie Dimon is an example. He had his pay cut all right. Sorta. But he won't be in the soup kitchen anytime soon. It was cut because of a $6 billion loss caused by what JP Morgan Chase Bank's directors called a "serious mistake." Uh huh. I would call a $6 billion dollar loss of depositors' money a serious mistake.
As a result, he'll only take home $1.5 million in salary and $10 million in stock awards this year. Last year, pre-mistake, he took home a total of $23 million. So he took home about half and lost about $11.5 million.
I may not be a math wiz like Chase's Board. But I'm pretty sure 11.5 million is a small percentage of 6 billion. And he gets to keep his job.
He took us all pretty good.
Being a maker is hard work. You gotta be on the make for a sweet deal almost constantly.
America, ya gotta love it.