THIS is what is wrong with business today.

this makes me sick. We say we're in a "recession," just imagine how much could be staved off if rich, undeserving fucks like this weren't so greedy...

say we give him $2 million. How many AMERICAN JOBS does that create? Now imagine if every greedy money-grubbing CEO were not as greedy.

Fuck this bullshit. We need to do something to counter this runaway greed in america.

This guy didn't steal the money. His package wasn't a surprise. The board of Mattel offered him the money and he took it. How is it *his* fault for accepting the compensation?

The problem is the package itself, and the board for being irresponsible enough to offer it.

I blame the CEO and the board. They can all go pound sand. Of course the reason they have all that money to throw at an exec who has tried to weasel out of responsibility for tainted toys is because most of the work is done with no oversight in China.

If the toys were made here where there would be a bit more legal recourse and it would be helping our economy they would supposedly go broke. See back to what happened to the hamburger factory out east that went out of business after a massive e-coli outbreak. Or the one butchering downer cows.

Exactly how many jobs do they create here in the US? If all they are doing here is marketing & executive functions the whole company could go out of business and I would see it as a good thing.

Anyone who thinks American CEOs, corporate boards, and shareholders have any interest whatsoever in creating "American" jobs, you're just fooling yourselves.
That train left the station long ago.

In Search of Excess...

Clearly this is what the market will bear. Corporate America panders to whatever will get them a sweet valuation on The Street and The Street doesn't care for things like equitable compensation.

Once a company decides that its most important metric is a good P/E ratio everything else goes downhill fast.

Just remember to keep this in mind. Increasing the minimum wage eliminates jobs, and does not help the working poor, and hurts business. We all suffer as a result.

We are better off when there is lead paint in our children's toys, and when we are evicted to the sidewalk when mortages reset. Misery and poverty strenghens the soul, and prevents obesity, diabetus and other ailments.

that is true. we should all just live off the land and hunt wildebeasts.

IF I owned Mattel stock I would dump it in a heartbeat after reading this nonsense.

It's sickening

So if over the next year due to the crappy economy and disgust with Mattel's unsafe products they lose tons of money and their stock tanks then what?

They didn't seem to care about poisoned toys and they don't care about keeping jobs here why should we buy their stuff?

This has been going on for years. These companies keep eroding the ability of their customers to buy their products. At some point it has to burst.

Who's part of the board that came up with this sh*t? Y'all are a self serving cabal, aren't you?

@azntg:

The Board of Directors
[investing.businessweek.com]

Those on the Compensation Committee
[investing.businessweek.com]

you guys are funny.

@Eoghann: want to guess who put the board in place?

@bohemian: If you don't like it, buy some Mattel stock and vote for directors who'll reduce his pay. If you don't own Mattel stock, then what are you complaining about? This is money that's coming out of their pockets, not yours.

@doctor_cos:

Absolutely. They don't care about American jobs, they care about finding the cheapest possible labor in India or China to make their crap so they can reap all the profits.

@redhand32: Nice straw-man, Redhand.

Er, how are Mattel's "domestic designers" at fault for tainted products? Do you even know what a toy designer does? Obviously not.

Designers create the "look" of the toy, and design or oversee the style and content of the packaging, and also "choose" the materials to make the toy from. When I say "choose", it's something along the lines of choosing whether you want beef or chicken in your burrito-- hard ABS, rigid PVC, soft PVC, rubbery crayton, polypropelyne, etc. No designer in the history of that company ever said, "Hey, let's save money and make this toy from LEAD TAINTED materials".

Certainly the company must take (and has taken) blame, but don't blame it on "designers" unless you know what the heck a designer does. It goes without saying that foreign factories will cut safety corners in order to save a buck, so ultimately you should blame a lapse in stateside QC for the problem. That has nothing to do with "designers".

If you decided how much your coworkers were paid, and they decided how much you were paid, you would be paid like this, too.

"China is pitching in for green week. From now on, all toys from China will be made with recycled lead." ~Jay Leno

To me it seems that when these CEO's get their companies into all those messes that their "retirement perks, etc" aren't payment for jobs well done, but bribes! Heck if it were ME and I were head of some company that say had been knowingly importing baby rattles and pacifers from China that were coated with lead paint before it were ME that would be going down and headed to some federal prison I'd be threatening to names the names of everybody before during and presently who knew what was going on and if they didn't give me EVERYTHING I'd ask for we'd all be heading to jail "handcuff in @#%@#$#$%#@$^" handcuff, to quote Ordel Roby in "Jackie Brown".

@mikelotus: The shareholders?

The CEO's pay does come out of our pockets. The money a company makes comes from what it charges for it goods or services, and who is it charging my friend, why us the consumer made ever dumber by all that led consumed.

Where's Robin Hood when you need him?

Also, that finger? I can guess exactly where it's going.

Fun exercise for the reader: How many homes in foreclosure could be saved for 12.2 million? How many inner-city kids could go to college? How many underfed families could eat?

I hope he buys something with it that blows up and kills him due to lax safety regulations.

@mikelotus: do some research before making dumb comments

Considering Eckert was with Kraft/Philip Morris for so many years prior to Mattel, he is well-versed in the art of being compensated for shilling toxic products. Don't like him? Then don't buy Mattel products--there's plenty of other plastic crap being produced for children by other manufacturers.

The Mattel stock is starting its long steady slide downwards. Lucky for the board investors are like college students. Once you piss a class of investors off enough for them to leave a new group will come in once your next quarters results come in.