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Thread: This makes even Wayne LePew look like a piker

  1. #1
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    This makes even Wayne LePew look like a piker

    Extract from an article in today's WSJ:

    By Brody Mullins
    June 6, 2019 8:51 a.m. ET

    WASHINGTON—One Saturday morning last month, U.S. Chamber of Commerce President and Chief Executive Thomas Donohue arrived in Greece with his girlfriend and another couple after an overnight flight on a Gulfstream jet provided by the chief advocacy group for American corporations.

    After a week sailing in the Greek islands, Mr. Donohue continued on the jet to Tokyo and Beijing for three days of business meetings before returning on it to Washington. The total cost? At least $600,000, according to estimates by four private-jet-service companies.

    The Chamber disputed those estimates but declined to provide the trip’s actual cost, saying it negotiates flight rates and gets a volume discount.

    It is an unusual perk granted to Mr. Donohue: the use of a corporate jet service for personal and business trips. The Chamber pays for all of Mr. Donohue’s business trips. But the group also picks up nearly all the costs when Mr. Donohue is flying on vacation.

    For some personal flights, Mr. Donohue reimburses the Chamber a heavily discounted fare, according to the Chamber’s rules. Other times, the Chamber covers the full cost; in those instances, Mr. Donohue is required to pay income tax on the value of the flight. But Internal Revenue Service rules often allow travelers to report a far lower value for the flight than the true market cost.
    Around the World
    CEO Thomas Donohue's trip last month on a corporate jet provided by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce included both business and personal travel, including a week of sailing in the Greek islands.

    That arrangement makes the Chamber an outlier among major Washington trade associations, which are funded by donations from member corporations or entities. No other chief enjoys the same perk, according to a Wall Street Journal review of the 35 largest associations, as measured by annual revenue.

    Even the use of private jets for business trips is rare among these groups’ executives: Only three of the other large trade organizations allow it, and two of those say they haven’t done so in years. The only other association that has used a jet service recently is the National Business Aviation Association, which represents the corporate-plane industry. Its travel policy says its president can use private planes on rare occasions if there is “no commercial airline service to a destination or commercial airline service does not meet the time commitments” of the trip.
    "A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity, an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty” ---Sir Winston Churchill
    "Political extremism involves two prime ingredients: an excessively simple diagnosis of the world's ills, and a conviction that there are identifiable villains back of it all." ---John W. Gardner
    “You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.” ---C. S. Lewis

  2. #2
    Join Date
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    Its tough at the top.

    Our company quit the chamber, in fact our CEO (a guy you know if I remember right-Stu) was a director and couldnt agree on sustainability matters. The break up reminded me of the kind of frustration lots of NRA members had with the direction of the org.

    This entitlement bs is rampant with corporate execs and is a big part of why I hung it up. I was on the outside for years because i didnt rip off the company. My last boss actually directed me to waste money on a perk. He refused to put it writing of course. Plick.
    "Back after 5 years. I thought you had died.

    don"


    Splitting my time between the montane and the mesas

    The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
    But I have promises to keep,
    And miles to go before I sleep,
    And miles to go before I sleep.

  3. #3
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    Quote Originally Posted by CactusCurt View Post
    Its tough at the top.

    Our company quit the chamber, in fact our CEO (a guy you know if I remember right-Stu) was a director and couldnt agree on sustainability matters. The break up reminded me of the kind of frustration lots of NRA members had with the direction of the org.

    This entitlement bs is rampant with corporate execs and is a big part of why I hung it up. I was on the outside for years because i didn't rip off the company. My last boss actually directed me to waste money on a perk. He refused to put it writing of course. Plick.
    He needed you to be as corrupt as him so that when the **** hit the fan he could throw you to the hounds.

    I built a restaurant five? years ago that was actually one of eight? in Charleston, Savannah and Columbia. It was owned/inherited by a brother and two sisters who didn't get along. For their yearly new car it was who could spend the most and the same spend the most for their company car. All profits were split equal but they would try every year to spend more than the other yet it all came out of the same pot. Entitled, all three of them, no business acumen no common sense no idea of the worth of money if that makes sense, there was so much of it (money)that even the stupidity couldn't break them. Had they not been related it would have been the same thing, who could spend the most on expenses.
    Last edited by mgrist; 06-07-2019 at 08:32 AM.
    This is your mind on drugs!

  4. #4
    Join Date
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    Several years back when I was going into business (you all remember which one), one of the first commercial accounts we opened was at Sam's Club to buy business supplies...I opened the account for the business using my credit, and as a result they gave us a $15,000.00 credit limit...My un-silent partner found out and immediately wanted to buy a $14,000.00 boat they had on display..."But we can always make minimum payments!" he said...My silent partner (his wife) added her 'no' vote to mine, and that was the end of it...It was a bad omen that grew worse over time......Ben
    The future is forged on the anvil of history...The interpreter of history wields the hammer... - Unknown author...

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