2009 Winners and Losers
[Guest post by DRJ]
Who were the financial winners after the Obama Administration’s first year? Here are a few I can think of:
Goldman Sachs executives earned record cash bonuses but bowed to political pressure and took the bonuses in restricted stock options instead.
Washington, D.C., and the federal government bureaucracy had a booming 2009.
Kiplinger’s top three “Best Cities” for 2009 — ranked for their “stable employment and new career opportunities” — are all heavily dependent on government jobs.
Last but not least, 2009 was lobbyists’ most profitable year.
Feel free to add more winners in the comments. I think we all know who the losers were.
— DRJ
Palin was a winner. she went from earning $125,000/year and $500,000 in debt to legal bills as govenor to being a multimillionare.
And also in control of a $2.1 million PAC.
a true rags to riches story.
unseen (f8f32d) — 2/12/2010 @ 9:47 pmobviously, we can add “unseen” to the “loser” category…..
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 2/12/2010 @ 10:20 pmthe Iranian government is doing well under this administration, as is Venezuela, Cuba, and a host of other totalitarian regimes.
the USA and Honduras, OTOH, are pretty much undergoing a total body colonoscopy for the next few years.
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 2/12/2010 @ 10:23 pmI think Fox News had a banner year as people deserted the more biased news outlets and the liberal brand in general.
daleyrocks (718861) — 2/12/2010 @ 10:59 pmThe Washington Post made out quite well thanks to a huge infusion of Obama-Pelosi-Reid education stimulus money to the WAPO subsidiary Kaplan Education.
GE/ NBC/MSNBC is the best known example of the marriage of corrupt corporation married with a bewhored news outlet but WAPO is the slutty little sister of GE/NBC. Without the money flowing in from taxpayer financed stimulus, the WAPO is just another failing leftwing rag a la LA Times.
The WAPO management, editors and staff are dependable Obama bootlickers slightly balanced by columnists like Krauthammer and Will with the very occasional Broder or Millbank brush with sanity.
Other big winners:
Soros, Trial Lawyers, China, UAW.
LaFong (f606e5) — 2/13/2010 @ 7:00 amPalin mentioned a huge no-bid contract that the Barcky admin gave out to a big-time Dem donor. Does anyone know anything about that?
JD (d4820c) — 2/13/2010 @ 7:14 amUnions (in particular, public employee unions), and Cuba, Venezuela, Russia, NoKo and Iran all had banner years in 2009.
The American taxpayer, Americans who work in private industry and “the opposition” in Iran were chief among 2009’s losers.
GeneralMalaise (4d34a1) — 2/13/2010 @ 8:48 amBusinesses that facilitate home repossessions and bill collection are booming, I hear.
Socratease (9673e1) — 2/13/2010 @ 9:00 amWinners this year, as in every year: Fannie and Freddie execs, running these slush fund entities into the ground at the bidding of the Congress, giving out our money in free mortgages to people who can’t or won’t ever pay them back.
Bonuses for Govt Hacks
Patricia (e1047e) — 2/13/2010 @ 10:31 amdeferred stock options will be even more lucrative when they avoid tax as regular income with various timing of sales schemes.
clyde (b9834b) — 2/14/2010 @ 12:28 pm