It has often been said that those with radical pretensions when they are young gradually turn conservative as the years go by. Perhaps it’s true.
nce upon a time, I tried to understand why anyone would deliberately act to damage their neighbours, for their own profit. What was it, I wondered, in their background — in their childhood, in their schooling — that led them to view the rest of us as suckers?
My Fianna Fáil family and my Fine Gael neighbours shook their heads at such liberal nonsense. They muttered about sin and greed and bad blood.
These days, as the conservative mists of age embrace me, I no longer excuse bad deeds. With a quivering, pointing finger, I reject lenience and demand they pay a price for their deeds.
I refer, of course, to bankers.
Last year, as the summer faded and we began to wonder if the virus might begin to weaken, the bankers launched their annual whinge campaign.
We Want More Money!
In the second year of a pandemic, as death and illness and persistent worry afflicted us, our concentration was on getting vaccines into arms.
Various public-minded individuals suggested new ways to protect ourselves from an invisible enemy. Some argued convincingly for ventilation strategies — finally appearing to get the attention of the authorities.
Scientists explained complex technical stuff that might help us non-specialists better understand our dilemma.
Statistical analysts put their skills at our service. Artists made videos — a poem or a piece of music, to sooth or to enthuse.
There was one guy brought his cello outside a cottage and made lovely music in the country sunshine and put the results online, just to help out.
Through all of this human endeavour, the concerns of the bankers remained unchanged.
We Want More Money!
What was it, I wondered, in their background — in their childhood, in their expensive schooling...
Always the same old whinge. Million-euro salaries and bonuses went out of fashion a dozen years ago, after the bankers crashed the economy. Since then, the poor dears in the bailed-out banks have had to put up with a pay cap of half a million euro a year.
Oh, the pity of it.
So, with wearying persistence, they repeatedly demand this terrible burden be lifted from their backs.
Now, on the whole, I don’t give a toss how much bankers are paid — and I suspect that’s how most of us feel. They’re paid too much, no doubt, and this squanders money that would more usefully be spent in other ways. But there are too many things to worry about, and mostly I just don’t care about bankers.
But, when you think about it — and the political response to it — there’s something truly wrong going on here.
The bankers repeatedly claim that a pay cap of half a million means they can’t compete for the best talent — and this hurts the banking system, and the country.
It’s nonsense, completely lacking in evidence, but the bankers’ campaign is always treated with respect by the media.
Politicians are afraid to give in to the demands of their pals, because it might create a public backlash. But they respectfully promise the bankers they’ll have some responsible people look into the matter and produce a report, and they keep those promises.
Where’s the evidence that big bucks attracts banking talent?
In a mad gallop for market share — to enhance reputation, increase salaries and generate unspeakably large bonuses — the bankers who were paid millions ignored the basic safeguards of their jobs. They destroyed their own banks and crashed the economy.
Sheer greed.
On its own, this would raise questions about the ethos in the banking business, and about the reverence shown to the bankers by their buddies in political office.
But, on top of this, there’s the long criminal history.
What is it in banking that attracts the loosely ethical?
There were the vast tax fraud schemes of the 1980s and 1990s, the hidden offshore banking scandals of later years, and the widespread fake ‘non-resident’ accounts.
And, of course, the gangster-level ‘tracker’ scandal.
In that scam, they took people’s money, people lost their homes — all part of the culture of greed. And now — one year after another, even as we endure thousands of deaths in a pandemic — the cry goes up again and again and again.
We Want More Money!
And the politicians mutter: ‘Cool it lads, we’re doing our best, but we can’t do this as fast as ye’d like.’
One prominent politician, a former minister, showed his mettle as a tribune of the people by alleging that in the tracker scandal the banks had “fleeced” the public.
That politician, Fine Gael’s Brian Hayes, has since hired himself out to the bankers — and he now lobbies on their behalf, demanding the removal of the pay cap.
I’m sure his former political colleagues have a rounded view of the bankers and their problems.
Some bankers used to get two or three million a year. For this, we got some of the worst bankers in the world.
The regulators hired to police these people got big bucks as they sat by, nodding their assent to it all. As did the government ministers who complacently presided over the economy as the bankers set it on fire.
A decent salary attracts those who like the work — in any job. Big bucks attract the greedy, who are too often also the reckless or the incompetent.
We are interdependent. We sort it out, who prefers this or that kind of work, who’s good at what.
Now, the average ICU nurse couldn’t do the work of a banker. She’d need special training — which would take probably a fortnight.
And the average banker wouldn’t last 10 minutes shifting crates of food, working as a delivery driver for Tesco.
No one should be on a ‘minimum’ wage, and no one needs millions to get by in this society.
That doesn’t require a sterile search for some nominally perfect equality — it requires merely an ability to differentiate between fairness and greed, which isn’t all that difficult.
An analysis of wages published by the Nevin Institute last June showed the inequality between those on the highest wage and those on the lowest is greater here than in “any other high-income European country by some margin”.
Not enough, for some. The culture of greed seeks a return to the good old, grab-all days.
The big bucks culture gave us collapsing banks — a persistent campaign to restore that culture is not in our interests.
As well as their millionaire salaries, bankers miss their extravagant bonuses.
Anyone looking for a bonus on top of a salary is saying: ‘Unless you give me a big chunk of money on top of my salary, I won’t do my job to the best of my ability.’
No self-respecting employer would hire someone displaying that attitude. Glorifying bonuses guarantees the talent of a workforce is diluted — fewer attracted to the work, more attracted to the big bucks.
There’s no evidence of a shortage of competent bankers in this country. The bankers that brought the country to its knees were never any good — they were admired not for genuine achievement, but for the size of their misleadingly bloated remuneration.
The culture of greed of the ‘tiger’ years went out of fashion, but it survives — and nowhere does it thrive more hungrily than in the banks. A culture that considers half a million a year a deterrent to attracting talent is one that can’t tell the difference between talent and avarice.
This year’s episode of We Want More Money! didn’t attract great support. We had other things on our mind.
No doubt there’ll be another episode next year, and for as long as that bizarre behaviour is tolerated.
