When you are a lowly worker, and you do something wrong, you may find yourself ‘standing in the street’. Fired, they usually call it. No job. No references. No prospects. Nothing.
If you are encrusted in the ‘top end’ of society, things are a little different.
You can lie, cheat and steal. And if you are a Member of Parliament, you can argue for immunity from prosecution, and, anyway, everybody does it. If you are something senior ‘in banking’, you can demonstrate stunning incompetence, and still expect a Golden Handshake from the bail-out money required to save the bank that fumbled the odd billion or two.
According to the song, the rich get rich and the poor get children. Even the words get twisted at the top. At one time, when the accumulation of errors became too embarassing, people used to ‘stand down’. Remove themselves from their exalted positions.
Not now. When the cream at the top goes sour, they no longer ‘stand down’, they ‘stand to the side’. No loss of status for these guys. No loss of pay, either.
So here’s my message to those at the top. If you screw up, or prove yourself arrogant and greedy, it is time to ‘drop out’. The only way is down … and out! There is plenty of room at the bottom. From where I am standing, that looks like the right place.