Greed Is Still Good

"Greed is Good..." remember those famous words uttered by the Michael Douglas character, Gordon Gekko, in the 1987 motion picture Wall Street? In light of the recent economic situation, someone reminded me of Gekko's speech in the movie. They alluded to the fact that the speech was about GREED BEING GOOD and that greed is pure evil, no ands, ifs, or buts.

That certain someone told me that the Gekko speech is an exact reflection of the current economic situation. Which he said was born out of Greed and Lust for Money and Power. My friend may be right (to a certain extent).

Here is the certain extent. Those three words are part of a larger speech in the movie, when Gekko is given his 15 minutes at a shareholder meeting.

Here is Gekko's speech in its entirety, please read it and then make up your mind as to what Gekko was really saying:



"Well, I appreciate the opportunity you're giving me, Mr. Cromwell, as the single largest shareholder in Teldar Paper, to speak. Well, ladies and gentlemen, we're not here to indulge in fantasy, but in political and economic reality. America, America has become a second-rate power. Its trade deficit and its fiscal deficit are at nightmare proportions. Now, in the days of the free market, when our country was a top industrial power, there was accountability to the stockholder. The Carnegies, the Mellons, the men that built this great industrial empire, made sure of it because it was their money at stake. Today, management has no stake in the company!

All together, these men sitting up here [Teldar management] own less than 3 percent of the company. And where does Mr. Cromwell put his million-dollar salary? Not in Teldar stock; he owns less than 1 percent. You own the company. That's right -- you, the stockholder.

And you are all being royally screwed over by these, these bureaucrats, with their steak lunches, their hunting and fishing trips, their corporate jets and golden parachutes.

Teldar Paper, Mr. Cromwell, Teldar Paper has 33 different vice presidents, each earning over 200 thousand dollars a year. Now, I have spent the last two months analyzing what all these guys do, and I still can't figure it out. One thing I do know is that our paper company lost 110 million dollars last year, and I'll bet that half of that was spent in all the paperwork going back and forth between all these vice presidents.

The new law of evolution in corporate America seems to be survival of the unfittest. Well, in my book you either do it right or you get eliminated.

In the last seven deals that I've been involved with, there were 2.5 million stockholders who have made a pretax profit of 12 billion dollars. [applause] Thank you.

I am not a destroyer of companies. I am a liberator of them! The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed -- for lack of a better word -- is good.

Greed is right. Greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms -- greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge -- has marked the upward surge of mankind.

And greed -- you mark my words -- will not only save Teldar Paper, but that other malfunctioning corporation called the USA. Thank you very much."

Is this speech still relevant?
I say it is. I say that the entire speech is very much relevant. The points that Gekko makes are all to hauntingly close to the today's business world. Greed for money drives the problems we are in now. Greed to make a quick buck, Greed to buy a house at the lowest possible interest rate, Greed to buy a car that makes us look better than the neighbors. However, Gekko is NOT exclusively talking about the kind of Greed that revolves around $$$. It is part of it but not all of it.

It is about the Greed that makes us want the best for the ones we love. It is the kind of Greed that motivates us to keep going to that job we despise knowing that at the end there will be something better. Greed also motivates us to leave a bad relationship for something better. It is also about the kind of Greed that makes us want to be a better person than we were yesterday that makes things happen.

Please, do not be fooled by Alarmist tactics that are designed to mislead the population to believe one thing when the big picture is something completely different.

Just as Greed is what got us into this financial mess, Greed is what will lead us out of this financial mess.

Greed is still Good and that is the bottom line.


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