Wall Street Employees Think Banker Pay Would Increase Under Romney

By Pat Garofalo/Think Progress

Wall Street pay this year is expected to increase by up to 10 percent over 2011, according to the latest surveys. And Wall Street financiers think that number Mitt Romney would be even better for their compensation, as Bloomberg News reported:

A win by Mitt Romney in tomorrow’s U.S. presidential election is more likely to boost Wall Street compensation than if voters re-elect President Barack Obama, according to a survey conducted by eFinancialCareers.

The poll of 911 financial-market professionals found 57 percent expect the election to change compensation, while 32 percent said it won’t and 11 percent said they didn’t know, eFinancialCareers said in a statement.

Of those who expect the election to influence pay, 72 percent view a victory by Romney, a Republican, as having a “positive” effect on compensation, the survey found. Re- electing Obama, a Democrat, was viewed as positive for compensation by 18 percent and negative by 71 percent, the survey found.

Romney has vowed to repeal the Dodd-Frank financial reform law, which includes measures aimed at reining in the bad pay incentives on Wall Street. It allows the Federal Reserve to veto pay packages that encourage risk that could lead to a new round of bank bailouts. It also allows for shareholder votes on pay packages; the first negative vote was handed to former Citigroup CEO Vikram Pandit.

High pay on Wall Street has exacerbated income inequality over the last several decades, and while bankers brought in higher and higher paychecks, they took on more and more risk, eventually culminating in a financial crisis. Now, even some Wall Street executives are pushing back against outsized pay packages. Morgan Stanley CEO acknowledged last month that Wall Street pay is “way too high.”

HOW BANKS BOUGHT THE TEA PARTY: Cash Transforms Populist Insurgents To Reliable Vote For Financial Industry

By Josh Israel and Adam Peck/Think Progress


The 15 freshmen Republican representatives in the House Tea Party Caucus each ran in 2010 on a populist anti-Wall Street message, highlighting their opposition to bank bailouts like the 2008 Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) and criticizing Washington for enabling the banking sector as it became “Too Big to Fail.” After winning, all fifteen received significant PAC contributions from the banking industry — and have become a reliable vote and mouthpiece for the financial industry, a ThinkProgress analysis of campaign contributions, voting records and public statements reveals.

Rather than campaigning on a typical pro-business platform, the Tea Party freshmen tapped into public resentment of big banks and bailouts. For example, then-candidate Sandy Adams (R-FL) said on her campaign website that she “opposes government bailouts” and “would have voted against TARP and the auto bailout.” Jeff Landry (R-LA) said bailouts of private businesses had “corrupted our free market system by rewarding the irresponsible and penalizing the responsible,” blasting “bank bailouts, which led to taxpayer money directly or indirectly going into multi-million dollar bonuses.”

But in Congress, the Tea Party has towed the line for big banks. Eleven of the 15 have become co-sponsors of H.R. 3461, a top priority for the ABA. According to Americans for Financial Reform, the legislation would “tilt the playing field further in the direction of excessive deference to industry interests and tie the hands of regulators attempting to protect the public interest.” The bill would make it harder for bank examiners to do their job, giving regulatory responsibilities to an industry that’s already shown it can’t police itself.

Here is what happened:

The lone Tea Party freshman member of the Financial Services Committee, Rep. Stephen Fincher (R-TN), has consistently voted with the industry and the Republican majority forweaker regulation of the sector.

And of the 15, all but McKinley and Rep. Tim Huelskamp (R-KS) voted for the GOP’s 2013 budget proposal, which included the repeal of a key component of the financial sector regulation.

Their rhetoric has also become extremely friendly to the financial industry. Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL) famously yelled at a constituent: “Don’t blame banks, and don’t blame the marketplace for the mess we’re in right now! I am tired of hearing that crap! This pisses me off!” Rep. Diane Black (R-TN) bashed financial regulations as “part of a pattern of government interference in the private sector.” Rep. Blake Fahrenthold (R-TX) warned “excessive regulations will hurt our financial institutions.” Rep. David McKinley (R-WV) said that by regulating banking and financial institutions, “what they’re doing is getting into our lives. And many of us are trying to find a way to get them to pull back.” And several of the freshmen criticized Dodd-Frank’s regulations for limiting credit availability for small businesses.

Video: 1994 Mitt Romney Explains How 2011 Mitt Romney’s Wall Street Donors Will Corrupt Mitt Romney

By Ian Millhiser/Think Progress

No one has benefited more from wealthy donors seeking to influence the 2012 presidential race than Mitt Romney. As of last August, Romney received more lobbyist contributions than the rest of the GOP field combined. His largest single source of campaign revenue is Wall Street bankers, and a massive 10 percent of all American billionaires donated to Romney’s campaign. So it should come as little surprise that Romney is a big supporter of allowing the rich and the powerful to buy and sell democracy — Romney recently pledged to appoint more justices like the ones who joined the egregious Citizens United decision.

As with so many of Romney’s positions, however, he didn’t always feel the same way. Back in 1994, Romney delivered a speech — to a group of business leaders nonetheless — calling formuch stricter campaign finance laws:

I am personally of the belief that money plays a much more important role in what is done in Washington than we believe. I personally believe that when campaigns spend the kind of money they’re now spending — this race, I understand, Ted Kennedy will spend about ten million dollars to be reelected. He’s been in 32 years. 10 million dollars — I think that’s wrong. And that’s not his own money, that’s all from other people, and to get that kind of money, as an incumbent you’ve got to cozy up to other people — all of the special interest groups that can go out there and raise money for you from their members — and that kind of relationship has an influence on the way that you’re going to vote. [...]

These kinds of associations between money and politics, in my view, are wrong. And, for that reason, I would like to have campaign spending limits. [...] I also would abolish PACs.

Watch it:

The Mitt Romney of 17 years ago was exactly right. When a candidate accepts millions of dollars from wealthy individuals and special interest groups, that kind of relationship does influence how they will govern when they are elected. Indeed, that’s exactly why Wall Street and one in 10 billionaires are planning to get exactly what they paid for if Mitt Romney is elected president.

As His Poll Numbers Tank, Perry Adopts Populist Rhetoric: Calls For Jailing Bankers

By Pat Garofalo/Think Progress

2012 GOP presidential contender and Texas Gov. Rick Perry has been plummeting in the polls recently, with the latest numbers showing him at 8 percent in South Carolina and just 2 percent in Florida. In an apparent attempt to revive his campaign, Perry has decided that espousing anti-bank populism is the right approach. Perry said in a speech in New Hampshire today that the bankers who wrecked the economy should be thrown in jail and that he opposes executives at bailed out banks receiving bonuses.

However, his solution to the problem of banks’ undue influence in the economy is to simply promise “no more bailouts” and then have Congress pass a Balanced Budget Amendment to the Constitution:

Not the large banks that were overleveraged. Not the insurance company that took on too much risk. Not even executives who continued to get these huge bonuses even after the walls had crumbled down. No, the people that are paying the price are average Americans. Main Street businesses. It’s our children who stand to inherit the worst fiscal mess in the history of this country. It is wrong, it is unfair, it is unjust. We shouldn’t be awarding taxpayer funded bonuses to Wall Street executives who defrauded those very same taxpayers. We ought to be locking ‘em up.

Mr. Speaker, when I’m the President of the United States, we will clean up corruption from K Street to Wall Street so that they can not gamble with our childrens’ future again. And it starts with a simple promise. No more bailouts, whether we’re talking about bailing out bankers in America or we’re talking about bankers in Europe. No more bailouts. It continues with my pledge to end wasteful earmarks. And I won’t stop until Congress and the American people pass a Balanced Budget Amendment to the United States Constitution.

Watch it:

It’s entirely unclear how Perry thinks that a BBA — one of the worst ideas in Washington, for a whole host of reasons — would help rein in the biggest banks. Perhaps he thinks it will prevent the government from spending money in a TARP-like fashion? And for someone professing such a concern for the power of Wall Street, Perry is on record calling for the repeal of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law. “This president does not understand how to free up the small businessmen and women or, for that matter, Wall Street,” Perry has said.

This isn’t the first time that Perry has gone populist when it comes to Wall Street, saying in 2008 that the banking industry “has too often been run on greed.” But when it comes to solutions, Perry suggests a favorite GOP budget gimmick that has nothing to do with the problem at hand.

Romney’s Raised Millions From Wall Street Bankers, More Than Twice As Much As President Obama

By Pat Garofalo/Think Progress

Back in July, the Washington Post noted that many of GOP 2012 presidential hopeful Mitt Romney’s largest donorswere Wall Street bankers, led by employees of mega-bank Goldman Sachs. Bloomberg added today that, so far, Romney, even in a crowded GOP field, has raised more than twice as much from Wall Street as President Obama:

Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney has raised more than twice as much money from Wall Street as Barack Obama — an edge gained in part by luring away at least 100 donors, mostly investors, who backed the president in 2008, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

The former Obama donors are helping the former Massachusetts governor lock up Wall Street dollars as Romney races to financially outpace primary rival Texas Governor Rick Perry in advance of the Sept. 30 third quarter deadline for campaign fundraising.

Romney has raised $2.3 million from the financial sector, while Obama has raised about $850,000.

The financial industry’s support for Romney should come as no surprise. After all, he has made attacking the Dodd-Frank financial reform law — aimed at preventing a repeat of the 2008 financial crisis — a centerpiece of his campaign. Likening financial regulators to “gargoyles,” Romney has called for the complete repeal of Dodd-Frank (even though he’s admitted that he’s not sure what’s in it).

Romney spent his business career in the financial sector, working at a private equity firm that caused thousands of Americans to lose their jobs. He has also appointed the chairman of a Wall Street front group to be one of his policy advisers. That’s evidently a perfect recipe for pulling in piles of Wall Street cash.

UPDATE

Politico reports that Romney is hauling in another $1 million today with a fundraiser in Manhattan.