Andrew Yang, the 44 year-old tech entrepreneur running for president with a platform of unique policy ideas, has called for jailing failed CEOs and shareholders, including potentially Warren Buffett and Mark Zuckerberg.
“Here’s an idea for a dramatic rule,” Yang wrote in his book The War on Normal People, published last April and set for paperback release next month. “[F]or every $100 million a company is fined by the Department of Justice or bailed out by the federal government, both its CEO and its largest individual shareholder will spend one month in jail.”
Yang, who until recently was not taken seriously by election analysts, has seen his unique policy positions make him popular with an Internet following that has pushed him to the debate stage. His big business accountability law, which he calls the “Market Abuse Act,” would expose many of the biggest names in business to prison sentences if enforced broadly.
In 2008, Wells Fargo took $25 billion in bailout money from the federal government, which would translate into roughly a 20-year sentence for Buffett, who owns the largest individual share of Wells Fargo stock through his company Berkshire Hathaway. If a 20-year sentence was not enough, Buffett would have had another 20-month sentence tacked on when Wells Fargo paid over $2 billion in fines to the DOJ.
In addition to Buffett, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg would also be at risk for jail time. Facebook is under investigation from the Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission, and FBI for its role in the Cambridge Analytica data scandal. Former FTC and Justice Department officials said Facebook could be facing hefty fines of potentially over a billion dollars.
Under Yang’s proposal, if the DOJ is the one leveling the fines, Zuckerberg, who is both the CEO and controlling shareholder of Facebook, would be spending months, if not years, in prison.
Yang wrote in his book that the intent of the Market Abuse Act is to target executives and investors who prey on the market, especially those involved in the 2008 financial crisis. During the crisis, well over 100 companies took at least $100 million in bailout money. And in the decade following, the DOJ has imposed over $60 billion in fines on top financial institutions, which would equate to upward of 100 years of combined jail time for CEOs and shareholders.
Yang also gave the example of the Purdue Pharma, owned by the Sackler family, which was fined over $600 million by the Department of Justice in 2007 for misleading the public about the addictive nature of OxyContin.
“If this rule had been in place during the financial crisis,” said Yang, “we would have had the heads of the major banks all lined up for prison sentences. The Sacklers would have spent time behind bars.”
Yang acknowledged his proposed law would create a dramatic increase in government, especially since he wants to give the president the authority to unilaterally “claw back the assets of any such individual to repay the public.” But, he argued that such a measure would show that “CEOs are not above the public good.”
