Ouch! This is gonna hurt you more than me...

It's not just for animals...

From Harold B. of Minnesota, the word for this post is "Castration".

Harold is a college friend and his suggestion makes me worry about him. I'll be calling and making sure he's all right.

Normally, I post pictures related to the subject of the blog entry but I just can't bring myself to do it.

Castration comes in many forms and happens for many reasons: The castration of Eunuchs to protect the harems, men who go through the painful and extremely expensive sexual reassignment surgery, and of course, what women have been doing to men for centuries... just without a knife (unless your name is Bobbit).

I'm fortunate enough to be married to a wonderful woman who came from a matriarchal household. After my third date, my future mother-in-law took me aside and told me in her thick Eastern European accent "If you touch my beloved daughter, you will never salute sun again..." My wife learned from her mother and to this day, I wear a metal sporran. Castration can come in many forms.

Financially speaking, I wonder why haven't corporate boards or activist shareholders haven't castrated CEOs like Zeus upon Uranus. Corporate Boards hire CEOs with iron clad contracts as if all these fine upstanding citizens are the Michael Jordans of the business world. I'll remind everyone there is only one Michael Jordan. The closest superstar in the business world is the one and only Warren Buffett. Even Bill Gates is no Warren Buffett. Why can't we just go back to the tried and true way of pay for performance?

The only CEOs who seem to have their salaries castrated are the ones from companies which received American Tax Payer bailout money. While I haven't had much positive to say about Obama's economic wonderboy (His Royal Highness Larry Summers), I'm thrilled the Pay Tzar (with the extremely spiffy title of Special Master for Executive Compensation) Kenneth Feinberg has drastically cut 25 salaries of executives in seven companies. Maybe other companies can learn this important lesson. "He who has the gold, rules."

"Socialism! Communism! Populist Government run free enterprise!" I hear from my fellow University of Chicago free market economists. To them, I reply "Codswallop!" Once the government has to bail your sorry over-leveraged balance sheets out of the fire, you've lost all right to hold your head up high and claim free-market economics! The companies and the people involved do not deserve to have their full paychecks! The poor executives who still have jobs will have to live on a mere $5,000,000 a year. Like the rest of us they'll have to learn to shop in Wall Mart, Target and (gasp!) K-Mart! Like I tell my kids, "You broke it you pay for it!"

Financial Book of the Blog

Animal Spirits: How Human Psychology Drives the Economy and Why it Matters for Global Capitalism by George Akerlog and Robert Schiller.

Ranking: 3.5 Stars

Only Professors Akerlog and Schiller can take the simple of idea that worth is in the eye of the buyer and turn it into a turgid densely written tome. Still they have some good points but only people with an economics graduate degree should read this book.

Next week "Carriage Return".

Peace.

Financial Improvisor!