Finally mad at an Auto CEO getting cheated

[Chuck]

Lee Iacocca's pension would be among the obligations Chrysler will no longer have to pay if it gets bankruptcy court approval to sell itself to a “New Chrysler.”

http://www.msnbc.msn.com - May 29, 2009

While I know he is not hurting, the thought of his successors dropping the baton so badly is infurating. --Ed.

New York - Lee Iacocca, the car executive credited with saving Chrysler from bankruptcy in the 1980s, is to lose a big chunk of his pension and a guaranteed life-long company car due to the U.S. automaker’s bankruptcy filing two decades later.

Chrysler CEO Robert Nardelli told a U.S. bankruptcy court on Thursday that Iacocca’s pension would be among the obligations Chrysler will no longer have to pay if it gets bankruptcy court approval to sell itself to a “New Chrysler” to be owned by its union, the U.S. and Canadian governments and Fiat SpA.

Iacocca, the storied former chairman and CEO who revived Chrysler in the 1980s and appeared in car commercials, has participated in a supplemental executive retirement plan that was comprised of non-IRS qualified pension funds and is subject to bankruptcy.... [Read More]

[southerncannuck]

I'm trying hard to summon up concern about this.

[chilimac02]

It's my personal opinion that the "greatest generation" has had their retirement funded by the current working force. But that's ok because they funded the retirement of the prior generation... oh wait... Nope, before them it didn't happen!!

[koreberg]

@chilimac02

And their children have done their best to ensure that it will not be available for the generations that follow.

IMO nobody should get payed a pension for work they did in the past. Everyone should get paid that much more now, and either work forever, or save. This is extremely prevalent in the entertainment arena, with copyrights lasting longer than most people will live.

This should be done more often, the execs are fleecing the country of its wealth. Compensation for execs should be determined by those who work for them, and not by the execs themselves.

[jkp1187]

Sublime irony, if you ask me. Iacocca was the one who convinced Congress to throw $1,200,000,000.00 at it in 1979 (in 1979 dollars, mind you...adjusted for inflation in 2007 dollars, more like $3,385,797,314.00,) and then was in the vanguard of those asking for trade protection and other special favors from the government as a hedge against Chrysler's (and Detroit's) inherent uncompetitiveness versus European and Asian carmakers.

Remember all those idiotic "BUY AMERICAN!" commercials that were shoved down our throat in the '80s? (As if it was somehow more patriotic to buy junk made in America versus a superior product made overseas.)

Chrysler's subsequent implosion has Iacocca's fingerprints all over it, if you ask me.