I sure hope that these poor CEOs can find the support they need from one another to withstand the unfair attacks they are getting from the parasites. They are so isolated in their gated communities, flying around in their personal jets and being escorted to their VIP tables that they end up feeling lonely. Nobody understand the troubles they've seen. Sure, the millions in salary, bonuses and golden parachutes are nice. But they can't make up for the fact that hardly anyone can understand what it's like to walk in their Berlutti's.What is the point of Davos? That is the question many of the 2,500 official delegates to this year’s World Economic Forum might ask as they flock to the Swiss ski resort. Not to mention the rest of the world asking the same question.
Never before in human history have so many competing conferences existed that purport to convene the world’s thinkers: the Aspen gathering, the Clinton Global Initiative, the International Monetary Fund meetings, and others, clutter the calendar.
Yet this year a record 1,400 CEOs and other senior business executives will attend the event. Never mind the so-called “age of austerity”, Davos and its canapés continue to pull the crowds.Why? John Studzinski, a long-time Davos devotee and investment banking leader, has one theory. “Being a CEO can be a lonely existence in terms of trusting ears and advice, so they come to Davos to meet and talk one-on-one,” he says. Davos had become a “self-help” group, where CEOs trade information and feel solidarity in a hostile world. “It’s a bit like Weight Watchers,” he quips. “A place where CEOs can get support.”
Like many jokes, this carries a large grain of truth – particularly this year. At Davos some of the business surveys released will show that the world’s CEOs feel pretty cheerful about the outlook for their own companies. Profits are rising, the US economy is growing and emerging markets are expanding at a startling pace.
But what is striking is that this veneer of micro-level optimism goes hand in hand with a gnawing insecurity about the macro picture. This is partly because CEOs are uneasily aware that hostility towards elites is rising. And while much of this has been focused on bankers, continued high levels of unemployment have prompted wider concerns about a bigger backlash in the west.
Plus, they're sacred that the plebes are going to cause trouble:
Perhaps they should be scared:A recent survey of Davos participants revealed that “social inequality” is the issue delegates most want to debate.
Americans have grown less trusting of business in the past year, bucking a global trend of rising confidence in companies, governments and other institutions, according to data to be presented at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
I'm guessing that Americans just don't like whiners --- especially those who have already "won the future."Just 46 per cent of Americans last year said they trusted business, down eight points from 2009, according to research by Edelman, a communications consultancy, which will be presented on Wednesday. Global trust in business was up two points to 56 per cent, by contrast.
The US decline has been driven by a backlash against bankers and their bonuses, with the number of Americans who trust US banks dropping to a low of 25 per cent, down from 33 per cent a year ago and 71 per cent before the financial crisis.
[A]nother reason for the unease is the sheer speed at which power is shifting across the world amid technological change and the growing influence of emerging markets. That, in turn, is creating conflicts in areas ranging from food resources to currencies.
I'm guessing everyone would be a lot better off if they spent a little bit more time worrying about that and a lot less time worrying about why the parasites aren't worshiping at their feet. But then, I'm guessing that most of them aren't real John Galts at all, but rather good "networkers" and gladhanders and strivers. American corporations are full of them.“The level of instability goes up as rebalancing gathers pace,” says Dennis Nally, chairman of PwC.
Worse still, CEOs – like everyone else – find it increasingly hard to work out where the new risks lie. For while the global systems are now more tightly interconnected than ever (in the sense that shocks can be quickly transmitted), these systems are also more fragmented (in that few people understand what is happening in other specialist areas.) The world thus feels like an increasingly murky, complex and unpredictable place, where shocks keep emerging in areas ranging from credit markets to oil technology to Tunisia.