Every year when the Big Three auto companies announce salary increases for their top executives, the news media of the nation celebrate a kind of ritual sacrifice of these men. This sacre du printemps generally begins with an editorial blast from the New York Times, followed by verbal fulminations in Time and Newsweek, followed by a note of rising hysteria on the television news. Just why it is that the auto executives—out of the thousands of people around the country who make big salaries—must act as victims of this gnostic ritual is a mystery of faith. We see them in television interviews looking like Sydney Carton as he ascended to the guillotine. They are fated men. They lead lives of quiet desperation.
“Hello, dear. Home early, aren’t you?”
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