Thursday, September 06, 2007
You Know What This Means...
by Tom Bozzo
The Rocky Mountain News (via) quotes a Corporate Library analyst calling the arrangment "ridiculous." A forthcoming report from this analyst on personal use of company jets shows only 28 out of 215 companies allowing such arrangements (not including Qwest).
Am I too cynical, or am I hearing the sound of 187 CEOs getting on the horn to the lawyers who handle their employment contract negotiations?
Bonus:
For the boards, at least, the better argument would be that paying someone a few thousand bucks an hour to cool their heels in a security checkpoint line isn't a great use of resources. But that argument probably only gets them into a Citation (and not the Citation X, either). Cue the Boogeyman to make the leap to the G550.
So Qwest shareholders and/or ratepayers will get to pay for the CEO's wife and stepdaughter to commute between Denver and their present California residence on the company jet (apparently a Falcon 2000).
The Rocky Mountain News (via) quotes a Corporate Library analyst calling the arrangment "ridiculous." A forthcoming report from this analyst on personal use of company jets shows only 28 out of 215 companies allowing such arrangements (not including Qwest).
Am I too cynical, or am I hearing the sound of 187 CEOs getting on the horn to the lawyers who handle their employment contract negotiations?
Bonus:
"I don't have a problem with a board saying, 'We think there are security issues here,'" [Corporate Library analyst Paul] Hodgson said.Bah. Corporate aviation departments have pretty good safety records, but they're no better than Part 121 airlines. Nor is it very credible to suggest that there's a significant threat to corporate managers and/or their families between airport curbsides and gates beyond the indignities of shoe removal and the occasional frisking.
For the boards, at least, the better argument would be that paying someone a few thousand bucks an hour to cool their heels in a security checkpoint line isn't a great use of resources. But that argument probably only gets them into a Citation (and not the Citation X, either). Cue the Boogeyman to make the leap to the G550.
Labels: conspicuous consumption, The New Gilded Age, Trains Planes and Automobiles, Unintended Consequences
