In 2016, Sacred Heart University purchased G.E.’s
headquarters in Fairfield, Connecticut for $31.5 million. Gone were the Persian
rugs and lavish artwork. The property acquired included the “Guest House,” the
company’s 28-room hotel “to serve visiting executives and others, with no
expense spared on the parquet floors, wood-burning fireplaces and a Steinway
piano.”[1]
Jack Welsh oversaw the ornate construction, leading to the obvious question of
just what his sense of fiduciary duty to the company’s stockholders was. An
artificial distinction between managers—only some being styled “executives”—was
doubtless behind the luxuriant excess only for those certain employees “in the club.” From the standpoints of a board
and its stockholders, “executives,” managers, and other employees are all employees. Why then should some of
them be associated with luxury while they are at work? Historically, the
aristocratic luxuriated precisely because those people didn’t have to work, and
more importantly, they viewed work (and even their own money) as not worthy of
much attention—there being finer things
in life. “Executive” employees are not aristocratic, for they labor even when
they could live off their accumulated wealth and pursue loftier aims, such as
aiding humanity, furthering knowledge, or engaging in the arts with an eye
toward advancing civilization. Bill Gates got this memo; Warren Buffett did
not.
The full essay is at "Corporate Governance Accountability."