Randall Lane: Wall St. Protestors Don’t Hate Success, They Hate Big Rewards for Failure

I hate big rewards for failure.. Congress has failed, The president has failed, The CEO's of the major companies that have went bankrupt have failed.. What do they all have in common? None of them have went to Jail..Why? Because they are all in on it!! Jon Corzine is the poster child of what is wrong with politics and corporate america.. They are Clueless..

The ax continues to fall on Wall Street.

Citigroup is drawing up plans to eliminate about 3,000 jobs, or 1 percent of its global work force, and on Wednesday, BNP Paribas announced plans to cut about 1,400 jobs, or 7 percent of its staff.

While Citigroup has not settled on a final number, the staff reductions could exceed 3,000, with roughly a third coming from its securities and banking unit, said one person with direct knowledge of the plans who spoke anonymously because the numbers were not final. Citigroup has already notified some employees who will lose their jobs in the coming months. The timing of the layoffs is also uncertain, and could take place throughout the next year.

At BNP Paribas, almost 400 jobs will be eliminated in France, with the remaining layoffs coming at the bank's international operations.

The moves reflect the broader austerity measures across Wall Street.

Goldman Sachs has prepared to eliminate about 1,000 jobs, or roughly 3 percent of its work force. The bank also could cut up to $1.45 billion in costs, or 5 percent of its expenses, as DealBook previously reported.

Bank of America, perhaps the most embattled American banking giant, has already shed 3,500 jobs in recent months, and that its only a starting point. The bank, which continues to labor under the weight of its troubled mortgage business, could yet decide on a broader round of job cuts resulting in 30,000 layoffs.

New York is feeling the pain. Some 10,000 securities industry workers could lose their jobs through 2012, bringing total reductions to 32,000 since January 2008, according to a report by the New York state comptroller.

@Finaceguru

Recent numbers show the unemployment rate for college graduates at 4%.

Is it correct to assume (given the first part of your post) that your are a part of this select group?

If so, one might wonder what special qualities you possess that 96% of your peers do not that allow you to remain unemployed, angry and disenfranchised from your perch as one of the educated privileged in this, the richest country in the world.

I too am a "finance guru", having graduated from a top business school, but I am guessing that's probably where the similarity between us ends. I have held a paying job continously since I was 7 years old. I worked all through high school and college at minimum wage and below. I worked retail, restaurants, bars, you name it. Never once did I stop and think "hey, I'm working hard, my country owes me a living, health benefits and a pension for my old age"....I just did the best I could. When I got out of school (in the middle of a horrific recession) I took the first job I could find and repeated the process.

Nobody owes me a goddamn thing and nobody owes you a goddamn thing my friend. The sooner you get that through your over-educated head and stop feeling so sorry for yourself the sooner you will start the process of making it in this world on your own. A nice dividend will be that along the way you just might find your balls and your self-respect. Good luck.

Read the "Coming New Dark Ages: The Truth About the U.S. Economy" to see why the debts of the world's advanced economies can be reconciled only by default, regardless of fiscal policies.

Why dont the wallstreet bunch protest PROFESSIONAL SPORTS,TALK ABOUT GREED! Most of these folks cant even add,use proper English,or work fullytime,some are felons,have criminal records,beat their wives,have DUIs. They have no investment in the product they represent and yet they want a % of the profits.

More is wasted on injured and crappy NBA , MLB and NFL stars that dont perform and still collect a HUGE paycheck. Larger amout than corportate buy outs of Executive contracts. Lets Occupy them too.

The media is a joke! They slam the tea party for wanting a smaller government and less debt, but the Hemp Hoody, Socialist crack babies, supported by Soros, Acorn and SCIU are treated with kid Gloves. You Reporters make me sick.

I said it before and I will say it again,these protesters should be sitting in front of their congressmen and senators homes and the white house. They just cant seem to understand this! They all cant be unable to understand this. If change is going to take place it has to be by legislation. Surely they dont think wall street Is going to send each and everyone of them a check and find them a job. Obama and congress are not paying attention to them,they are to busy trying to get re-elected. We really got change as was promised,CHANGE FOR THE WORST.

Candace hippy girl--Really ,You want to friggin Barter? ...OK CHAKA, I trade you this rotten tobacco Leaf for your beaded man purse. Come ON! Plus you want to Boycott banks? You can keep your 401K in your moms tupperware bowls in her basement. Have fun Bartering for a HOUSE dude. People are just too Stoned!

Socialism is working well in Greece, and countries run by their labor unions, like France, Italy and Spain seem to be doing well. And Portugal is doing well, and WHAT? You mean their not doing well? Never mind

The greates danger to a democracy is an IGNORANT electorate. We are toast!!!!!

ALEX1444 - where in this article did you see the 99% figure????? Only number I saw was 68% and the phrase "majority". And, in case you have just woke up after a more than 200 year sleep, it doesn't take 99% of the vote to represent the people. It really only takes a simple majority (i.e. more than 50%) of "electors". Your vote only determines which set of electors will be the representative electors for your state. You don't even have a choice of how that set of electors is determined. Article II of the US Constitution states, " Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress:". And, GET THIS, these electors are not sworn by law to vote the same way they are assigned. In other words, if the Republicans win the popular vote in a state, then the Republican slate of electors will cast their votes for President. With our two party system, they are always assumed to vote for their particular party nominee. However, they are NOT required by law to do so. So, it is possible that a Republican elector could cast a vote for the Democratic Presidential nominee. Also, they cast SEPARATE votes for President and Vice-President, which again, do not have to be along party lines. So, a single elector COULD vote for a Democratic President and a Republican Vice-President. However, his political career would probably be in doubt from that moment on.

Excellent video! As I've posted before, capitalism is the production and sale of goods and services in the free market. Moving money from one pile to another in not the essence of capitalism. It's gambling. We can't have a functioning, growing economy that is primarily based on moving money from one pile to another. We have to produce, and Wall Street doesn't produce anything.

The issue is that most corporate boards and officers in the large companies have become leeches that siphon off corporate profits bleeding the companies dry then leaving the dead husk behind as they move engorged on their feast to the next corporate victim. Stock holders - the owners of the company - are mostly powerless to stop it and take the only recoarse available which is to sell the stock. Steve Jobs was one of the exceptions you encounter who has taken the well being of the company as a priority over his own enrichment.

Alot of us have been financially devasted by the last few years with payouts for incompetence in the senior ranks of corporations excelerating while you and I just get a pink slip with a push out the door. There has been alot of discussion about the disparity which didn't exist in the US 20 years ago. Yet, congress isn't listening, corporations aren't listening. I continually hear corporations proclaim that they make the jobs, not us. Well, then it may make sense to doing targeted boycotts of key companies and their products. If we really don't make the jobs, then they really shouldn't care if they don't have any customers.

Aaron Task needs to go back to English class. "THERE problem is the perception that Wall Street..." Hey Aaron, the word is THEIR. As for the article itself, it clearly explains the reason for the demonstrations. Me? I took my money out of Wall Street, used it to buy rental real estate and I'm looking to buy more units. In the late 70's/early 80's people got fed up with Wall Street's 2 steps forward/3 steps back: there was a huge rush to buy rental real estate in 82/83/84. I bought a property for $30,000 in January of 1980 with a very small down payment and sold it for $50,000 eighteen months later. History WILL repeat itself. That was 30 years ago and Obama is the new Jimmy Carter. Take your money away from these #$%$ We are at the mercy of huge crooked banks and companies that hire CEO's who couldn't handle a one can milk route. When they finally fire these morons, the multi-million dollar golden parachutes they give them #$%$ away what little there is of the shareholders' money left and you and I are left holding the bag. Take your money out of Wall Street NOW. The Dow is going nowhere for a long, long time, folks. Real estate is cheap and mortgage rates are at record lows!!! Only investors are buying real estate now. Buy now, hold your properties until the lemmings knock down your door, sell for a nice profit, the Dow will be down then. Buy the stock market at that point, watch it take off and give the finger to Wall Street, the crooked banks, and the CEO's as you cash the checks and play them like they deserve to be played............at your local home town Credit Union!!!

There is no free war. There is no free financial bail-out. The question is "who will pay?" How about the war profiteers, and the reckless bankers who needed a bail-out?

Too bad Blodget can't chime in -- he was rewarded handsomely with a job at Yahoo after being banned from the securities industry...

YOU ARE AIMING AT THE WRONG PEOPLE, THE ROTHCHILDS OF ENGLAND ARE THE RICHEST BANKERS ON EARTH..........THEY CONTROL EVERYTHING...............

and this is the thanks we get for bailing out wall street in the first place is it any wonder why people are protesting them down with wall street and all the greed that goes with it.

So they don't like the execs of failing companies not sharing in the pain. Fair enough. But if the govt hadn't bailed them out the execs wouldn't still be prospering. While too big to fail concerns were valid in some instances, its still a govt failure for things like repealing Glass-Stegall, failure to regulate CDSs, etc. Seems like their anger is misplaced.