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.
Gordon Gekko
Greed is good!
Leider wird dieser berühmte Satz fast immer aus dem Zusammenhang gerissen zittert. Wodurch seine Bedeutung, bewusst oder aus Unwissenheit, in Negative verzehrt wird. Was seinen extrem negativen Ruf erklärt. Dabei ist der Satz, in seiner richtigen vollständigen Form, siehe das Zitat am Anfang, eine geniale Motivations-Rede. Weswegen Steve Jobs eine Variation davon auch mal bei einer Rede vor Studenten benutzt hat.
Klar Gordon Gekko ist ein Reinrassiger Kapitalist der nur aus Gewinnstreben handelt, keine Frage. Es geht ihm „nur um die Kohle“ und er betrachte Geldverdienen auf Kosten anderer als ein Spiel. Moralische Bedenken existierten für ihn in keiner Weise.
Aber gerade in der heutigen Zeit, wo in der Sozialen Marktwirtschaft moralische Bedenken über (schmerzhafte) wirtschaftliche Notwendigkeiten gestellt werden, könnte ein besinnen auf die Regeln der echte Marktwirtschaft helfen. Warum soll der Staat Milliarden in sterbenden Unternehmen stecken, die schlecht wirtschaftet haben. Nur um ein paar Arbeitsplätze für 3-4 Jahre zu „sichern“. z.B.: Galleria; Lufthansa; etc. Wer meint ich Übertreibe, der sollte sich mal die Geschichte der Stahlindustrie in Duisburg Ende der 80er anschauen. Es wäre sicher sinnvoller, diese Milliarden in (neue) Unternehmen und Technologien zu stecken, um so Arbeitsplätze zu schaffen, die langfristig sicher sind.
Somit ist die Teldar Paper Rede in ihrer Gesamtheit(!) auch heutzutage, nach genau 35 Jahren, immer noch hoch aktuell und wichtig.
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 own less than three percent of the company. And where does Mr. Cromwell put his million-dollar salary? Not in Teldar stock; he owns less than one 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 luncheons, 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. 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.
McHenry's Lair 