The Obama administration plans to name Kenneth Feinberg as its “pay czar” to oversee compensation of executives at companies that have received federal bailout funds, the Wall Street Journal is reporting.
Feinberg oversaw the federal government’s compensation fund for victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. His appointment could be announced next week, the Journal reports.
SEE RELATED:
With all of the czars we’ve got — drug czar, wars czar, etc. — you’d think we were living in imperialist Russia. Then again …
Because the federal government has so much public money invested in these private companies, it has a keen interest in making sure the cash is well spent. And because it’s the federal government, it gets to make the rules. And other companies competing with these government-backed firms consequently face a bit of a disadvantage, muscle-wise.
But this isn’t anything like socialism or nationalization because the government says it isn’t. So there.
