Another Bank gets it's bonuses at our expense.

gerkin

lukekelly wrote: »

That's not true. Some bonuses are like that and some are not. As explained earlier some bonuses are company profit sharing, some are a reward for making individual targets and some are essentially a component of basic pay. No-one has argued that anyone employed by a loss-making organisation should receive a profit-sharing bonus.

I dont buy this argument. Bankers like to create hogwash like this. If the bonus was for meeting targets then they wont get any because their company went bust. Meeting targets is part of the job and that is why they get a salary. If the bank wanted to really really give much more money to their 'deserving' workers then why didnt they increase the basic salary? Why all this carrot dangling about bonuses ? I work 12 hours a day for my company which is doing well in this recession because we all worked really hard, none of us get a bonus but we all get salaries for our hard work. Why are workers in a bank more saints than other normal workers ?:mad:

Innys

chewmylegoff wrote: »

it wouldn't be called a bail out, but yes you would get state help if you needed it.

Errrrrrr.............if I were to become solvent, there's no way the taxpayer would guarantee my debts, which has what has happened with the banks. Instead, I would be left to fend off the creditors myself.

While you are correct that I would be entitled to state help, that would not take the form of guaranteeing my debts. It would be a weekly amount to enable me to survive. In addition, it would not be a reward for how well, or poorly, I had done in my job a.k.a. a bonus.

As a net contributor to the Brown regime, I am not entitled to anything like the state help that the Halifax has received.

Therefore, to say that they it's okay for them to be paid bonuses because they have paid more to the Treasury's coffers than they have recieved, implies the money I have paid to the Treasury is worth less than Halifax's.

chewmylegoff

Innys wrote: »

Therefore, to say that they it's okay for them to be paid bonuses because they have paid more to the Treasury's coffers than they have recieved, implies the money I have paid to the Treasury is worth less than Halifax's.

well unless you have paid several billion pounds in tax, then it is.

Graham_Devon

chewmylegoff wrote: »

well unless you have paid several billion pounds in tax, then it is.

No it's not. It's worth no less.

lukekelly_2

I dont buy this argument. Bankers like to create hogwash like this. If the bonus was for meeting targets then they wont get any because their company went bust. Meeting targets is part of the job and that is why they get a salary. If the bank wanted to really really give much more money to their 'deserving' workers then why didnt they increase the basic salary? Why all this carrot dangling about bonuses ? I work 12 hours a day for my company which is doing well in this recession because we all worked really hard, none of us get a bonus but we all get salaries for our hard work. Why are workers in a bank more saints than other normal workers ?

You may not buy it but it is true. It's not just in banking that people receive performance related pay, it's been around since Taylor if not before and in a whole variety of industries. Even teachers receive it now. Working in a job with no bonus/performance related pay is probably the exception not the rule now.

It's also quite possible for individuals to have made their targets and the organisation as a whole to have made a catastrophic loss. The remarkable situation would be if not a single branch manager or banker had met their targets. There are lots of problems with the pay system in banking but the very existence of performance related pay is not one of them.*

(*I'd say these include the difficulties of measuring performance and a bonus structure that, combined with the basic financial security of senior bankers, incentivises risky behaviour: if you're financially comfortable then given a gamble where there's a 90% chance of you making the bank a lot of money and receiving £1 million and a 10% of you screwing the bank over completely and receiving £0 is a good one to take. It's clearly an absurd risk for the bank to take though, and so the current incentive structure has deep problems.)

chewmylegoff

Graham_Devon wrote: »

No it's not. It's worth no less.

an interesting opinion, perhaps you could try that argument out in practice by attempting to buy a £1 million house with a £1 coin.

Graham_Devon

chewmylegoff wrote: »

an interesting opinion, perhaps you could try that argument out in practice by attempting to buy a £1 million house with a £1 coin.

You said it's not worth the same. A pound is worth a pound.

But are you suggesting that someone who pays more into the treasury should be able to take more out? Therefore if I pay less in than someone up the road, because he earns double, he should get preferential treatment?

Theres 2 ways of talking about somethings worth and the value that has. You have taken the very basic £2 is worth more than £1 route.

chewmylegoff

Graham_Devon wrote: »

You said it's not worth the same. A pound is worth a pound.

But are you suggesting that someone who pays more into the treasury should be able to take more out? Therefore if I pay less in than someone up the road, because he earns double, he should get preferential treatment?

no, i have taken the route that £1 million is more than £1. or £1 billion is more than £100,000. where the disparity is so large it is obviously in the interest of the govt (and all of us) to give preferential treatment, not least in the anticipation of large future tax revenues.

Graham_Devon

chewmylegoff wrote: »

no, but where the disparity is so large it is in the interests of the govt to give preferential treatment, not least in the anticipation of large future tax revenues.

Well then I pay 100% more in tax than my neighbour does.

Should I get more services?

Innys

chewmylegoff wrote: »

an interesting opinion, perhaps you could try that argument out in practice by attempting to buy a £1 million house with a £1 coin.

The simple point is, all net contributors to the tax system (and I am pretty sure I am not the only one), are not entitled to the same benefits that Halifax has received. Remember that most other Companies are also net contributors to the Brown regime.

If you add up all these contributions they far outweigh the value of Halifax's contributions. So, why should they be treated any more favourably in terms of whether they are entitled to a bonus than anyone else?