Tell It To Al

There is no force in the universe powerful enough to stop escalating CEO pay.

The Institute for Policy Studies 19th annual report on executive compensation shows how U.S. tax policies encourage companies to overpay their executives. It figures after years and years of CEOs lobbying Washington D.C. to get the system to favor them over everyone else. 

Click here to read my column in The Sunday Wall Street Journal. And click here to read the full report from the progressive think tank.

You’ve read about people squatting in their own homes – not paying their mortgages yet not getting evicted either.

It is the story of our times. So much so it even and IRS agent can do it.

Beverly Hood, an IRS veteran, has been investigating financial frauds for a quarter century. But she ended up filing bankruptcy and having foreclosures proceeding filed against her when her husband’s business fail.

It is an irony that someone who investigates mortgage fraud gets investigated for mortgage fraud herself. It is also a warning that these hard economic times can hit anyone.

Click here to read my column on MarketWatch.

Forty-four states saw unemployment rates ticking higher in July – in step with the slight increase in the national rate from 8.2% to 8.3% reported earlier.

Unemployment rates are ticking up even as new jobs are being created because, let’s face it, job creation remains weak. Click here to read more details on the states’ rising unemployment rates.

This is a messy situation for President Obama’s reelection bid to say the least. Even if unemployment comes down from here, it’s not likely to come down much between now and November. Add the prospect of $4 gasoline, and it’s an easy argument to make that the promised hope and change were not delivered.

Things are bad enough that challenger Mitt Romney might not even have to offer a specific plan for turning things around. With unemployment this high, for this long, even a vague plan may sound good.

It took a long time for the radiation to kill Katie the goat, but her keeper, nuclear activist Nancy Burton, says her life is a warning to us all about the dangers of nuclear energy.

Click here to read my column on MarketWatch. And click here to learn more about Katie the goat from Ms. Burton’s website.

I’d always thought one of the first signs that we were truly in an economic recovery would be a drop in sales at McDonald’s.

Mickey D’s  has been boomed through this long spate of high unemployment and low income growth, serving as America’s food bank. But last week it posted a surprising decline in same-store sales.

Does this mean consumers are feeling richer and ditching the value menu in favor or pricier fare? Or is this a sign and increasing number of people don’t even have money for McDonald’s anymore?

Click here to read my column in The Sunday Wall Street Journal.

Kids these days.

Do they really need a bank to finance a lemonade stand?

When I was a kid, well, we didn’t have Young Americans Bank. We considered ourselves lucky if we could find a cardboard box large enough to use as a kiosk.

These days, it seems kids selling lemonade need everything from a regulatory compliance officer to a written business plan.

Click here to read my column on MarketWatch.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke says economists should do more to measure happiness.

He cite’s the Kingdom of Bhutan’s “Gross National Happiness Index” as one example.

Only problem is, the kind of happiness people feel in Bhutan doesn’t require money.

“We have now clearly distinguished the ‘happiness’ … from the fleeting, pleasurable ‘feel good’ moods so often associated with that term,” explains one Bhutanese leader. “We know that true abiding happiness cannot exist while others suffer, and comes only from serving others, living in harmony with nature, and realizing .. the true and brilliant nature of our own minds.”

Does an economy really produce happiness? And if you are dependent on the economy for happiness, can you be happy?

Click here to read my column on MarketWatch.

For a clear primer on how financial markets really work, check out the the Visual Guide to Financial Markets by David Wilson.

Mr. Wilson is a familiar voice on Bloomberg Radio, delivering hourly stock reports in his jovial but straight-forward muse. He’s also the guy who puts together Bloomberg’s enlightening “Chart of the day” column.

His book is guide for financial professionals and students alike, explaining everything from the Byzantine world of derivatives to the basic lessons people running some of the biggest banks in the world seem to forget, such as the tradeoff between returns and risks.

“Investors who pay too much attention to the returns can end up suffering unexpected losses when a change in market direction highlights the risks,” writes Mr. Wilson.

And, oh, how the risks get highlighted. Just ask the London Whale at JP Morgan Chase or Jon Corzine at MF Global. The financial world would be a safer, smarter place if the people in charge of our money kept this book on their desks.

A bridge falling into the Mississippi river five years ago should have been a call to action.

It wasn’t.

Bridge expert Barry LePatner has just launched a Google map marking 7,980 bridges that could fall like the I-35W Mississippi Bridge at any time. Check it out at www.SaveOurBridges.com. Search to see if there are any unsafe bridges in your area.

Americans seem to take for granted the infrastructure they inherited from past generations. These things take billions of dollars to maintain, yet they have gone neglected in a political climate that is often more about doling out favors to big corporations than doing what needs to be done.

Mr. LaPatner says fixing America’s most dangerous bridges would create 1.2 million jobs. And not fixing them is going to lead to more tragedies, like the collapse that claimed 13 lives and injured 145 five years ago.

Click here to read my column in The Sunday Wall Street Journal.

I suspect Chick-fil-A President Dan Cathy’s remarks about “the biblical definition of marriage” would not have resonated they way they have were this not an election year.

Having met Mr. Cathy, I think he’s doing what he thinks is the right thing. The problem with quoting the Bible to support a political cause is that the Bible can be quoted to support just about any idea, including slavery and emancipation from slavery. Both the North and the South used the Bible to bolster their positions  in the Civil War.

Click here to read my column on MarketWatch.