What Are You Working For?

So we've done a lot of complaining (after all, that's what this blog is for and what journalists do best) about what's wrong with the industry and how it's lost it's way. But what about when journalism is done right?
A couple of years ago, The Wall Street Journal did an expose on options backdating at major companies, where executives awarded themselves options, then dated them to when the stock was trading at or near lows. (The whole point of options is that they are granted on a date, and from then onward the exec has an incentive for the stock to go up, so that the options are "in the money.")
Well the practice was identified at more than one hundred companies and many investigations were begun by the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Justice Department. However, most companies settled the charges "without admitting or denying wrongdoing". And while the money often had to be returned or paid in settlement, in many cases the companies shouldered as much if not more of the burden than the execs. Even those that stepped down in the wake of the scandal did so with the help of their golden parachutes. The Journal lists only one criminal trial as a result of options backdating. And then there is Steve Jobs, whom the government did not want to tangle with since he's the most popular CEO in America, father of the iPhone and iPod.
Behold the power of journalism.