This is something I may or may not work on further. It’s an aggregation of CEO pay in 2009 and 2010, with cumulative changes based on company. 

It’s pretty unrefined data, I must admit. For example, it’s not uncommon to see companies give huge stock-driven compensation packages to new CEOs, so the strength of their investment is tied to the stock performance of the company. If, say, Morgan Stanley got a new CEO, the change in Morgan Stanley’s CEO compensation is substantial on this dataset. However, we’re almost comparing apples to oranges at that point with a new CEO.

I’d like to do a comparative data set that takes a look at company stock performance versus executive pay changes. I’d like to look at CEO pay changes versus average pay changes (ex-CEO), but I’m sure that data would be simultaneously hard-to-find and utterly depressing. Still, I do a lot of this because I hold that one shouldn’t gripe about how rich folks are paid if you aren’t going to do the homework to back it up. Let’s see what can be found. 

I love reading when Sarah Lacy (@sarahcuda) goes to awesome places like Nigeria. I like it not only because she has a great take on some obscure local events, but because she’s doing all of this with a huge burden on her shoulders - she’s pregnant and still just doesn’t quit.

I worked with a woman once at a sandwich place in Mississippi who was very likely the same way. She was pregnant up until the day she went into labor (at the store) and was back at work three weeks later. Unbelievable. I have nothing but respect for women who can do that. 

Number 1: Be able to do 100 pushups from rest. My general frame (read: skinny as mess) does not lend itself well to easy muscle growth, but I continue to push onward. According to the iPhone app I’m using, I’ve done 4,525 pushups since January 1. I can work with this.

Number 2: Run a marathon. I am back on that grind and am now back up to running six miles in a session. Next step will be taking the knee brace off so I’m not dependent on it. 

Number 3: Read 12 books. January was David Mitchell’s Ghostwritten (a spectacular choice). February was Mosby’s Rangers, a history book on my great-great-great uncle who was known as the Gray Ghost of the Confederacy. In March, I read Dante’s Inferno and Gary Vaynerchuk’s Crush It! April has been harder. I read Steven Pressfield’s Do the Work and parts of Plato’s Republic, but things have not been as successful as I hoped. I just started on Moby Dick for the month of May. 

Number 4: Design a personal website from scratch. Check out www.josephmosby.com.

Number 5: Brew a beer. We finished it! It’s a decent brown ale. A bit astringent - I was told that was due to Nashville’s over-chlorinated water system. Will use filtered water next time. I have also completed a tasty dry apple cider, clocking in at a nice 14%.

Number 6: Visit the Sam Adams brewery in Boston. Still not there yet.

Number 7: Call good friends in another city once a month. I have slacked off on this one and have a lot to catch up on. No excuses here. 

I built a form letter this week.

My form letter has a pretty simple purpose. It’s a request for reimbursement that gets sent from one firm partner to another. The sender just has to type in eight pieces of short info (name, country, etc.) and the form letter whizzes off to the printer for him to sign and mail. Perhaps his secretary prepares these and he just signs them.

Whether it be him or his secretary, consider what has happened here. Before, that letter might have taken six minutes to type. Now it will only take one minute. If a hundred letters are sent every year, and I have now saved this individual five minutes per letter, I have saved them an eight-hour workday.

A workday where they might be able to play with their kids, or get some household chores done, or take their employees out to lunch a few days. 

It’s not a glorious form letter, and the code that crafted it is not complex at all. But it does its job, and saves a little time. And that’s all it needed to do.

Just a simple piece of work well done saved someone else a day of their life. 

The title of FT’s article is “Oil price puts skids under Washington’s pre-eminence.” I tend to agree, but not with the conclusion.

I think back to the lampooning Jimmy Carter received after suggesting that Americans should simply buckle down in the face of ’70s hyperinflation. The American people could not stand the idea that we weren’t in control of our own fate was poison to our ears. 

High oil prices are an economic problem, as is housing, and the slowing growth of the U.S. consumer’s spending habits. But these aren’t signs of American demise in the face of China, and they aren’t problems to be solved in the traditional sense. They’re going to require unconventional solutions, since we can’t put more fossil fuels in the earth and the large young generation isn’t interested in your four-bedroom houses (yet, we’ll get there in ten years).

There’s no reason that America can’t rise above the problems in our face, but pretending that they’re going to be solved the same way they’ve been solved for the past 50 years. Making oil cheaper isn’t within our grasp with China’s growth (and we want China to keep growing), but we can figure out how to make America need less oil and make better houses in the future. I don’t know why this is “un-American” and a question that has to be avoided by our leaders. 

Once again, I ponder a duality in work ethic with the ideas of separate loci of control. Even though this is a dual-nature debate, don’t tie one to the Protestant work ethic and one to the Catholic work ethic of my last discussion. This is a separate idea entirely.

Psychology dictates that there are two loci of control: the internal and the external, which exist as a spectrum (a person is not wholly one or the other). With an internal locus of control, individuals tend to believe that they are responsible for the events in their lives, based on their personal decisions and efforts. Those with an external locus of control tend to believe that events are a result of fate or luck.

Those with an internal locus of control must generally match it with talent to avoid a psychological breakdown. For instance, if an individual who grew up hiking in the Appalachian mountains takes his internal locus of control and opens up a camping store, he will be more likely to find success. However, if he one day decides to become a professional golfer, he is very likely to have a psychological breakdown in his attempts.  

On the flipside, I believe someone with an external locus of control can often “deal” with bad situations that might lead to success when someone with an internal locus of control might just run to something else. There are positive and negative effects to both. 

All this being said, those with an internal locus of control tend to be more successful and psychologically healthy than those with an external locus of control. Still, the question remains - is the locus of control an inherent product (i.e. a belief system that can be changed) or an experiential product (i.e. things truly are out of someone’s control and they responded accordingly)? And if things ever truly are out of control, is it better to let them resolve themselves or stick one’s nose in the system to solve it?

gq:

Cute Childhood Photo of Our President

Obama dressed up as a very adorable pirate, with his mom in Hawaii. Feel the wrath of his mini-sword, birthers.

(via nytimes)

I wanted to issue a quick clarification on my most recent post. I did not adequately clarify that the “Protestant work ethic” versus the “Catholic work ethic” is often disconnected from the actual religions and practitioners thereof. 

Certainly, one can find Protestants with a Catholic work ethic and Catholics with a Protestant work ethic. These are often functions of social climates, church environments, priests/pastors, etc. 

The idea of these work ethics is driven by the work of one Max Weber, a German economist who penned a book called “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism.” They are determined by the culture and ideas of many of the religious groups Weber studied. 

I did not mean to offend any Catholics (there is at least one I can name). However, the theories have names, and I can’t change that. All I can do is attempt to interpret them, knowing only a smattering of European cultural history with which to compare it against. 

If I have improperly interpreted Weber’s work, I will repost any criticism of my interpretation. 

I did not know that the “Protestant work ethic” is an actual economic concept until today.

I had heard the term before when I was in Amsterdam, but I thought it was just a Dutch saying. Turns out that it’s considered to be a separate view of work from the “Catholic work ethic.” Please refrain from tying either of these too heavily to actual dogma, as I am discussing the economics more than the religion. 

The “Catholic work ethic” states that man must work to reach salvation. Though man receives some small measure of grace from the acceptance of Christ, he must prove it through works. Penance, good deeds, etc. all help the Catholic worker receive the glory of heaven. In short, the Catholic is working for a reward - and if there is no clear reward or the reward may be withheld, then there is no reason for the Catholic to work.

The “Protestant work ethic” says something different. Luther [and especially Calvin] believed that the Protestant was not working for a reward. The reward had already been granted, and diligent work was a sign of the covenant. Frugality and hard work were signs that man appreciated a gift from God - lavishness, even if the money was well-deserved from work, was to be avoided. Heaven forbid a man be born rich and simply live off the riches. 

Perhaps I am mistaken, but I believe many belief systems (Christian or not) would fit into one of these two camps. 

Interesting thoughts for a Tuesday morning. Going to do some more diving into the economics of these two ideas.