I do not believe in supporting bailouts without strong
ramifications. It is a fool’s fantasy to think we can live in a globally
connected economy and never have a situation arise where the government
prudently steps in to prevent a failure that might lead to
catastrophic ramifications. In most cases, I believe it would be much
better to let bailed-out companies fail when they have mismanaged
themselves, rather than waste taxpayer money propping up greedy
idiots who are trying to salvage their own bonuses; however, there
are exceptions to almost every rule. The wiser course would be to
penalize the CEO or board of directors who drove the company
to the brink of failure. The most obvious punishment would be the
elimination of any “golden parachutes” or bonuses for the executive
and seizure of all company-derived assets, including any attempts to
hide company assets in the spouse’s name. When C-level executives
come to the realization that managing a company is not a game and
that there are serious consequences for their actions, we will see fewer
instances of requests for bailouts.

Autor: Ziad K. Abdelnour