Looking on the bright side

So the news this morning was, once again, full of bankers' bonuses - should they, shouldn't they, how should the rest of us feel about them. Personally, I'm having to work quite hard on not turning into "Disgusted, St Leonard's-on-Sea" when I think about large quantities of money going to people who have caused great difficulties for many formerly successful companies who are now struggling to find credit to finance projects, or to cope with their margins disappearing in the black hole caused by sterling falling off a cliff.

And to be honest, I was not much moved by the explanation that failure to pay bonuses - even when the businesses have performed miserably - would be de-motivating and cause the "best" people to leave. When other industries are being forced to lay off workers, or pay them partial salaries not to turn up for work, when many of us are putting in extra effort because we're afraid that if we don't, it will be our job that goes as the recession bites harder, it is difficult to believe that bankers are still so insulated from reality, that they will chuck in their job if they don't get an extra lump of money. In fact, if it really is the case that they would behave like this, all the more reason to withhold the bonus payments, and let them go out there and try to find another position...

What I would prefer to believe is that most people aren't really just motivated by money. That doing a job well - the more so when times are tough - is often its own reward. In this industry particularly, we are surrounded by examples of businesses and individuals who are achieving great things in spite of having to overcome obstacles the average merchant banker probably couldn't dream of. People who have set up their own businesses because the world of work has deemed them too old, too disabled or just too much trouble to employ. Employers with the imagination to 'take a chance' on somebody who doesn't, at first sight, look like the first choice employee, who yet repays their leap of faith by delivering beyond all expectations.

We've seen how bad untrammeled capitalism is at running the world - perhaps now it's time to back the people who don't fit into the narrow stereotypes of traditional success, and see whether imagination and good-will can get us a bit further than recent economic theories have.