Like many, I was outraged by the announcement of Transocean's best year ever, accompanied by safety bonuses to top executives.
Tonight I am pleased to read this:
Transocean’s senior management team said it would donate the safety bonuses awarded to it for 2010 to victims of the Macondo well explosion that killed 11 people – nine of them Transocean employees. http://www.ft.com/...
Apparently, they received many critical comments, including those of Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar:“In my own view, 2010 was probably the greatest year of pain in terms of oil and gas development in the deep water all across the world, especially in the Gulf of Mexico.” and a few thoughts of my own.
Now before we praise these managers too profusely, a careful reading of the articles will reveal that only the "safety portion" of the bonus was donated to the victim's families. That equates to about 25% of the total bonus received, but at least it is going to the victims rather than into the pockets of company executives.
I could have given Transocean a grand lecture, but mostly I told them I knew what it was like to grow up Southern, poor and with a daddy who died before I was old enough to know him. The people around here would call their performance bonuses Judas Money.