Executive compensation
A while ago, I investigated how much CEO’s deserve to make. My conclusion, we needed better tools for quantifying the worth of executives to a company.
This presents a further challenge, that of determining the value of the executive to the company. Supporters of current executive salaries would argue that these people are the most important figures in gigantic corporations, and that their salaries reflect their contribution. Given that the ratio of a CEO salary to the average worker in the company is increasing so sharply, this would mean that the relative value of company executives has been rising exponentially.
Debates over executive compensation have ignored these trends, and commentators have failed to seriously investigate metrics that could actually measure the value of a CEO to a company. Unfortunately, that’s the only way to settle this contentious debate.
Glenn Beck attacks Obama’s religious beliefs
Are these sort of criticisms appropriate?
Glenn Beck’s Restoring Honor rally has come and gone, but the conservative television host is continuing to make headlines this week. On Sunday, he strongly critiqued President Obama’s religious beliefs.
Beck claimed that Obama “is a guy who understands the world through liberation theology, which is oppressor-and-victim.”
“People aren’t recognizing his version of Christianity,” Beck added.
Is Beck’s criticism of Obama a valid critique of the President’s philosophy or an inappropriate attack on a matter of personal faith? Read more
More on marriage
Douthat clarifies his argument
In his New York Times blog, Ross Douthat wrestles with one of the most persuasive critiques of his recent article against gay marriage; the notion that there is no reason to view heterosexual relationships as exceptional or “distinctive” in a way that merits them being prioritized over homosexual relationships.
In responding Douthat argues that:
The interplay of fertility, reproductive impulses and gender differences in heterosexual relationships is, for want of a better word, “thick.” All straight relationships are intimately affected by this interplay in ways that gay relationships are not.
Married with (biological) children
In today’s New York Times Ross Douthat dismisses many of the traditional arguments against gay marriage, but concludes by stating that heterosexual marriage is unique in an important respect.
This ideal holds up the commitment to lifelong fidelity and support by two sexually different human beings — a commitment that involves the mutual surrender, arguably, of their reproductive self-interest — as a uniquely admirable kind of relationship. It holds up the domestic life that can be created only by such unions, in which children grow up in intimate contact with both of their biological parents, as a uniquely admirable approach to child-rearing. And recognizing the difficulty of achieving these goals, it surrounds wedlock with a distinctive set of rituals, sanctions and taboos.
Is this “organic connection between human generations” so essential to the definition of marriage that allowing gay and lesbians to marry will undermine the essence of the institution? The other question is, what about heterosexual couples who cannot have children or would rather adopt? On what grounds do they have more of a right to marriage than a gay couple?
-Luke
Image used under a Creative Commons attribution license from Flickr user Steve Polyak
Journalistic ethics
Clive Crook of The Atlantic has an interesting take on WikiLeak’s handling of the documents on the Afghanistan war. In the piece, Crook draws a parallel between WikiLeaks and the Rolling Stone article on Stanley McChrystal.
A few weeks ago the McChrystal scandal was in the news. I asked a few journalist friends about it. “Suppose you had the story that Hastings had. But also suppose that you thought McChrystal was a great general, that the war was worth fighting, and he would have to resign if you reported what his team had said. Wouldn’t you feel some qualms about writing the story?” Most of my friends said that they might, but that good journalists suppress such thoughts because it was not their job to worry about it. Yes, I thought. So whose job is it, then?
I’m sympathetic to Crook here. The consequences of releasing this sort of information has to be a consideration for any reporter. On the other hand, if a reporter’s choice of stories is framed by her view that the “war is worth fighting” we could end up with a very subjective perception of the conflict.
-Luke
Photo by Flickr user The U.S. Army used under a Creative Commons Attribution license.
The court of public opinion
The New York Times has a cool interactive feature where you can compare your views on certain issues with the Roberts court and the general public. However, comparisons can be slightly misleading since the questions are framed as policy questions not constitutional questions. While readers are asked whether they would support a ban on partial birth abortion, the justices are not supposed to be considering whether or not the law is smart policy but whether it is constitutional.
-Luke
Is eating healthy a choice?
Or can the poor simply not afford nutritious meals?
A few weeks ago I explored whether we should subsidize healthy habits and tax unhealthy ones. In the post, I quoted Harvard economist Greg Mankiw, who questions if we should “trust” the government to act as our “guardian.”
To what extent should we use the power of the state to protect us from ourselves? If we go down that route, where do we stop?
Mankiw frames the issue as whether we need the government making choices for us, but in a recent blog post at The Atlantic professor Ellen Ruppell Shell questions this idea. Read more
Graham’s vote for Kagan
When should senators confirm judges whose judicial philosophy differs from their own?
On Tuesday the Senate Judiciary Committee approved Elena Kagan’s nomination to the Supreme Court. The vote split along party lines, with the exception of South Carolina Republican Lindsey Graham, who broke rank to support Kagan’s nomination.
Graham defended his choice by saying that while he disagreed with Kagan on many issues, he felt it was his duty to support President Obama’s nomination provided she was fair and competent. The conflict raises an interesting ethical and constitutional question, should, and if so when, may Senators vote against judicial nominees on ideological grounds? Read more
Happy 4th of July!
For Fourth of July several pundits at Bloggingheads TV debated the merits of patriotism. What a way to spend your holiday weekend, eh!
Attacking the notion of patriotism, Will Wilkinson of the Cato Institute argued that “loving liberty through ones country” is problematic because it leads to the assumption that America always acts in defense of these values. Wilkinson, a sharp critic of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, contends that Americans initially supported these conflicts so wholeheartedly in part because of a belief that our country “must be doing the right thing when it acts on the world stage.” Read more
The morality of espionage
When is is it justifiable?
Earlier this week, Marc commented the arrest of ten individuals for allegedly being involved in a Russian spy ring. The case is somewhat humorous in that the spies did not seem to be snooping for information of any significant worth; but, in any case, the incident raises some interesting ethical questions. For instance, when do the benefits of the intelligence obtained from espionage outweigh the deceptive means used to obtain that information? In their article Ethics and Morality in US Intelligence Arthur Hulnick and Daniel Mattausch explain that one can use Just War theory for determining the circumstances under which spying is permissible. Read more
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