600 men on a dead man's chest.

Yar, matey. We're talking like a pirate on Wall St.

"Banks that have their hands out in Washington this year were handing out multimillion-dollar rewards to their executives last year.

"The 116 banks that so far have received taxpayer dollars to boost them through the economic crisis gave their top tier of executives nearly $1.6 billion in salaries, bonuses and other benefits in 2007, an Associated Press analysis found.

"That amount, spread among the 600 highest paid bank executives, would cover the bailout money given to 53 of the banks that have shared the $188 billion that Washington has doled out in rescue packages so far."

This year, I hope things are different. Perhaps execs will fight over the dead man's chest of our current economy. Or perhaps they can work hard to actually earn compensation more closely proportional to the rewards others make in today's economy.

As a craftsman in wood, I'm left scratching my head. By doing something that involves development of skill, one discovers that there is greater pleasure in taking the more difficult path. But we have been pumping students out of the ivies, with little connection to hands-on skill, thrusting them into Wall Street, sedating them with monetary rewards beyond comprehension, and then wondering why we face such a distinct decline in economic power.

"Let the youth once learn to take a straight shaving off a plank, or draw a fine curve without faltering, or lay a brick level in its mortar, and he has learned a multitude of other matters which no lips of man could ever teach him" --John Ruskin, "Time and Tide", 1883.