On the June 26 broadcast of the CBS Evening News, anchor Scott Pelley announced that while "companies aren't cutting so many jobs as before," there's an exception:
One company that's still shedding jobs–lots of them–is technology pioneer Hewlett-Packard. That's part of the strategy of Meg Whitman, the CEO, hired to save the company.Pelley gives viewers a quick rundown of all of Whitman's successes, and wonders: "Can Whitman assemble a happy face now for HP?"
The segment by correspondent Anthony Mason portrayed Whitman as a bold turnaround artist. "When she took over Hewlett-Packard nearly three years ago," Mason says, "Meg Whitman literally tore down the executive walls." Viewers learn that the old office had stuffy walls, and Whitman wanted cubicles instead.
Part of the CEO's bold transformation plan, Mason explains, is a pretty simple one: "Whitman has announced up to 50,000 job cuts–about 14 percent of the company's workforce when she took over."
He goes on to say that it's hard for a company to "make these kind of transitions"–executive-speak for "massive layoffs"–but the segment very quickly turns into a promotion for a new product, "a radical redesign of computing," as the CBS correspondent puts it.
Mason closes the segment with this: "The CEO who built eBay knows Silicon Valley only rewards those who roll the dice."
It might be worth pointing out that the jobs-slashing CEO–who is already a billionaire–doesn't have to wait for this bet to succeed in order to receive a nice payday. Her compensation last year was $17.6 million last year (USA Today, 2/3/14).
CBS–which has a record of doing puff pieces about corporate CEOs (FAIR Action Alert, 11/26/12)–wants viewers to believe that the overpaid CEO who's bold and risky enough to try and fix a company by firing tens of thousands of employees deserves this kind of attention.
And what about the workers who are shown the door? Well, there's no nightly newscast report about them.
from here
2 comments:
This is just one of thousands of examples of the media being used to promote what is often an economy destroying recklessness of apparent 'business people'. Firing thousands of people to satisfy those with shares in the company.......Often hedge funds, private equity firms and obviously the investment banks. The future of this company will not matter much to these people as long as it can be flogged at the moment the cost cutting becomes visible in the accounts. The accounts may well show an improvement in the near future. But it is likely to be at the long term cost of the company.
You're right, anti-gerry, profits are what capitalism is all about, no matter what the cost to workers or the environment. Cut wages, increase work time, decimate the work force, outsource to a cheaper costs country. Wage slaves (and almost all of the world's population fit this category) are dispensable people, to be hired and fired at will which is the reason SOYMB calls for the abolition of wage slavery.
Post a Comment