February 9, 2006--Monkey Money
I'm on the road, in Spain, and thought to bring you something that appeared only in the International Herald Tribune. Sort of my version of Behind the IHT.
I suspect that you as I do not know Lakshmi Mittal. Until I read about him in the IHT (article linked below), his was a name with which I was unfamiliar. As you, I of course know who Bill Gates is as well as Warren Buffet, the world’s first and second wealthiest individuals. And so you can only imagine my surprise when I learned that Mr. Mittal is next, third on that elite list. So wealthy in fact that in 2004 his net worth grew at a rate of $36,000 per minute. Not bad.
But what is bad is his hostile take-over bid of $22.4 billion (how many minutes at $36K per does it take to get to $22.4 billion?) for one of Europe’s corporate icons, Arcelor Steel. Now there have been many such bids along our gilded way, but what is unusual here, and terribly, terribly upsetting to Arcelor and many, many European bystanders, is the who of this unwelcome bid—you see Lakshmi Mittal (note carefully that first name) is not one of us but rather one of them—from India. Forgive me, a Packi, generically, from there, the Colonies. I know you may say that’s all over; the Colonies are no more. Well, not exactly. Not when it comes to the colonial mentality.
The French particularly have been worrying about globalization. Not so much when it meant one could get simple things manufactured there on the cheap. That was OK. Just so long as the workers were being paid "Coolie Wages." And it was still all right when Algerians and Turks came as “visiting” workers and as such were willing to do all the jobs no one else wanted to do. And it was sort of OK when some service work was “outsourced” to Bangalore and Mumbai because who after all wants to answer the phone when someone calls to complain about a credit card bill or wants to sit at a computer terminal all day editing software. And besides the corporations doing the outsourcing could cut their local overhead and increase their quarterly profits.
But it stopped being OK when those “visiting” workers decided not to go home and to seek citizenship. And it certainly was not at all all right when these Wogs started to build their own universities and research institutes and began to become truly globally competitive. Even amassing enough capital to begin to have the capacity to turn the tables on us. Hence the bid for Arcelor and the cries of outrage.
First a measured reaction from Sebastien Montigny, head of business development for France at Infosys, the Indian outsourcer, “First, we were talking about the European Community and the plumber from Poland. Then China. Now, India is emerging as a new, big important economy that France has to deal with.”
Let’s now listen in on how they are dealing with this from none other than Guy Dolle, CEO of Arcelor. He had a few choice words about Mr. Mittal, who by the way was born in a rural Indian village that did not have either electricity or running water: Dolle says that Mittal Steel, an empire spanning five continents, is just a “company of Indians” made up of a “group of less-than-average” businesses that would pay for Arcelor in “monkey money.”
Less-than-average? Monkey money? Let’s hope there’s is a golden parachute awaiting Monsieur Dolle because he’s going to need it. Those monkeys are about to put him out of a job.
As a sidebar—the story about the “Pinstriped Indian” appeared on the front page of the IHT and then jumped to page 4. The rest of page 4 included the following stories—“World’s Muslims Unite in Anger Over Cartoons”; “Large Toll Feared In Ferry Sinking” (up to a thousand pilgrims returning from Mecca drowned); “Danish Satirist, A Muslim, Sees Laughter Ebbing Away”; and my favorite, “Wrangles Delay Voting On Iran’s nuclear Policy.”
While we’re worrying about monkey money Iran is building an A Bomb. With our oil money.
I suspect that you as I do not know Lakshmi Mittal. Until I read about him in the IHT (article linked below), his was a name with which I was unfamiliar. As you, I of course know who Bill Gates is as well as Warren Buffet, the world’s first and second wealthiest individuals. And so you can only imagine my surprise when I learned that Mr. Mittal is next, third on that elite list. So wealthy in fact that in 2004 his net worth grew at a rate of $36,000 per minute. Not bad.
But what is bad is his hostile take-over bid of $22.4 billion (how many minutes at $36K per does it take to get to $22.4 billion?) for one of Europe’s corporate icons, Arcelor Steel. Now there have been many such bids along our gilded way, but what is unusual here, and terribly, terribly upsetting to Arcelor and many, many European bystanders, is the who of this unwelcome bid—you see Lakshmi Mittal (note carefully that first name) is not one of us but rather one of them—from India. Forgive me, a Packi, generically, from there, the Colonies. I know you may say that’s all over; the Colonies are no more. Well, not exactly. Not when it comes to the colonial mentality.
The French particularly have been worrying about globalization. Not so much when it meant one could get simple things manufactured there on the cheap. That was OK. Just so long as the workers were being paid "Coolie Wages." And it was still all right when Algerians and Turks came as “visiting” workers and as such were willing to do all the jobs no one else wanted to do. And it was sort of OK when some service work was “outsourced” to Bangalore and Mumbai because who after all wants to answer the phone when someone calls to complain about a credit card bill or wants to sit at a computer terminal all day editing software. And besides the corporations doing the outsourcing could cut their local overhead and increase their quarterly profits.
But it stopped being OK when those “visiting” workers decided not to go home and to seek citizenship. And it certainly was not at all all right when these Wogs started to build their own universities and research institutes and began to become truly globally competitive. Even amassing enough capital to begin to have the capacity to turn the tables on us. Hence the bid for Arcelor and the cries of outrage.
First a measured reaction from Sebastien Montigny, head of business development for France at Infosys, the Indian outsourcer, “First, we were talking about the European Community and the plumber from Poland. Then China. Now, India is emerging as a new, big important economy that France has to deal with.”
Let’s now listen in on how they are dealing with this from none other than Guy Dolle, CEO of Arcelor. He had a few choice words about Mr. Mittal, who by the way was born in a rural Indian village that did not have either electricity or running water: Dolle says that Mittal Steel, an empire spanning five continents, is just a “company of Indians” made up of a “group of less-than-average” businesses that would pay for Arcelor in “monkey money.”
Less-than-average? Monkey money? Let’s hope there’s is a golden parachute awaiting Monsieur Dolle because he’s going to need it. Those monkeys are about to put him out of a job.
As a sidebar—the story about the “Pinstriped Indian” appeared on the front page of the IHT and then jumped to page 4. The rest of page 4 included the following stories—“World’s Muslims Unite in Anger Over Cartoons”; “Large Toll Feared In Ferry Sinking” (up to a thousand pilgrims returning from Mecca drowned); “Danish Satirist, A Muslim, Sees Laughter Ebbing Away”; and my favorite, “Wrangles Delay Voting On Iran’s nuclear Policy.”
While we’re worrying about monkey money Iran is building an A Bomb. With our oil money.
posted by Steven Zwerling at
11:47 AM
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