How to Earn Big Money

Andre Damon, "CEO pay sets new record as economy tanks"

Average CEO compensation grew by 3.5 percent last year despite slowing economic growth, falling profits and mass layoffs, according to an Associated Press review published Monday. The review found that the S&P 500 CEO received an average yearly compensation of $8.4 million, up $280,000 (an average raise that is the equivalent of six times the US median household income) during 2006.

The data render ridiculous those apologies for social inequality resting on the idea that CEO pay is linked to ‘performance' in some meaningful way. The Associated Press review found that "CEO pay rose or fell regardless of the direction of a company's stock price or profits." The report also notes that half of the 10 best paid CEOs—who collectively hauled in half a billion dollars last year—presided over companies whose profits shrank "dramatically" ....

.... John Thain, the CEO of Merrill Lynch, ranks first on the list. He received $83 million in compensation for the year, despite presiding over a company that posted a $9.8 billion loss in the fourth quarter. He replaced former CEO Stanley O'Neal on December 1, 2007. O'Neal left the bank with a compensation package worth over $161 million, despite his direct oversight of the bank's gambling with mortgage-backed securities that ultimately exploded in 2006-2007 ....

.... Looking at the AP compensation report, one is struck by the apparent correlation between a CEO's pay and the amount of social harm his or her company inflicts. The bankers who triggered a worldwide financial crisis got the biggest bonuses. Then we have the energy executives, whose compensation shot up some 32 percent last year as gas prices breached $4 per gallon, sharply reducing the real incomes of millions of working people.