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187 Comments
- inactive, on 09/19/2008, -5/+71outrageous is an understatement.
- drmangrum, on 09/20/2008, -1/+41At least John Mack show some integrity.
"Whenever companies hit hard times and have layoffs, employees like to see their CEOs falling on their own swords. John Mack, Chairman and CEO of Morgan Stanley, did just that last year. According to a Morgan Stanley SEC filing, "Mr. Mack requested that he not receive a bonus for fiscal 2007 due to the company's fourth quarter results.""
He still made 1.6 million, but that's peanuts in the financial market. It's kinda sad that only one person in that line up had the courage to take his lumps and stand shoulder to shoulder with the rest of the company.....well more or less. - Julie188, on 09/19/2008, -9/+42What is the justification for these kinds of salaries? That they work hard? We ALL work hard. This slideshow points out that they get the money whether they are successful at running their companies well or not. Maybe the ones in the "or not" category will be held accountable but all of them should have bigger strings attached to those kinds of salaries.
- Wosat, on 09/20/2008, -3/+35"The way CEOs become CEOs in America is a travesty. This is one of our major problems. I use the anti - Darwinian metaphor. The survival of the unfittest." -- Carl Icahn
http://digg.com/business_finance/Carl_Icahn_CEO_Se ... - sunsetprojects, on 09/20/2008, -1/+32The ex CEO of HP computers got 74 million for three years of destroying the company and a bonus 43 million just to leave the company. So if you work as a cop and start shooting people randomly send do you get a bonus?? If you can't do the job at any job that you can think of does the management say "ok your done thats it heres 75grand leave"? wow then I would always be a screw up.
- seltaeb4, on 09/20/2008, -4/+32Socialism is for the rich; capitalism is for the poor. That's the *real* American way.
- Armstrong3, on 09/20/2008, -5/+27Hmm...if we add all that money up, it would take out a nice chunk of what we the tax payers are paying to fix their mistakes.
- sereusx, on 09/19/2008, -8/+26Just how is their morning any different from other peoples? Bet they make time to eat/dress/ shave etc.etc. How much is that worth? How many hours are they sitting in an office? Do they do 9-5? How much would their hourly wages be? How many pairs of shoes do they have and how many bicycles can they ride at one time? I would like to be a fly on the wall to see how different their lives are to warrant such excess. Not to say that there are lots of people in the US that over consume, but this is really recockulus!
- lukedamonkey, on 09/20/2008, -3/+18So all I have to do is ***** up really bad and I get millions of dollars?
America is surely not fair.. - inactive, on 09/19/2008, -12/+26Do you control a company that oversees hundreds of billions, or even trillions of dollars on a daily basis?
It's all relative. Excessive, sure on appearance, but still relative none the less. - inactive, on 09/19/2008, -3/+16but they will gladly sell their poor performance portfolios to the FED.
***** you. - jellygraph, on 09/20/2008, -1/+12Useless ***** don't deserve it.
- daddymcguire, on 09/20/2008, -0/+10The $1 yearly salary is meaningless when you add up the other factors (stock, options, bonuses). Sure, taking the reins for a buck a year sounds charitable, but Jobs gets a heck of a lot more than a measly dollar for running Apple.
- raskali, on 09/20/2008, -1/+11Relative? I don't think so. Many small business owners sink or swim with their business and they are usually so invested that they'll go bust with the company. This means they have a real incentive to make sure the company performs well.
With these clowns there's no connection to performance, they get their salaries whether the drive these companies into the ground or not. The system rewards failure. - gridity, on 09/20/2008, -5/+15CEO's are not paid based on "how hard they are working" - their value to a company isn't based on the number of hours for which they "show up." It's not like those who work in fast food or retail. CEO's are paid to use their knowledge and expertise and experience. And that experience and expertise is rare, hence it's valued highly.
It's really all about supply and demand. There are fewer qualified / experienced people available to run giant companies than there are qualified people to flip burgers. Hence, a burger flipping job pays very little (because nearly anyone can do it) and CEO's get paid lots because very few are qualified to do it. Lawyers can make $500+/hr because of their expertise - it's the same sort of thing. If the job of a lawyer became as commonplace as fry cooks, they'd make the same as fry cooks.
And ...CEO's are human beings, and CEO's can screw up too. And these ones did just that. The fact that many of them made the same mistakes indicates to me it wasn't really just the individual CEO's faulty leadership. Something else is at play here. - GawtMilk, on 09/20/2008, -6/+15You work hard, sure, but if you have poor performance at work, does your company lose hundreds of millions or billions of dollars? Many people oversee millions of dollars at work, but don't get paid nearly that. If you only oversee a couple thousand dollars in risk, you aren't going to be paid as much as the people at the top positions of the company. The paycheck is to attract people who understand how to deal with that much money.
A fast food cashier operator makes less than a portfolio manager, because if the cashier operator messes up, McDonalds doesn't lose millions of dollars.
That is not meant to offend, nor imply you don't work hard. I'm not saying people who don't make hundreds of thousands of dollars a year are paltry in comparison to people who do, but nobody would accept a job with higher levels of risk and stress and equal pay. Companies understand that, so they pay more.
If a better candidate for CEO came along and demanded less money, they'd give the job to that person. But why would anyone in their right mind demand less?
That being said, when a CEO proves themselves unfit for the job; it is ridiculous how much they still get paid and how long they keep their jobs. Despite that, good CEOs deserve multi-million dollar paychecks - and there are thousands of them out there who do. - hangingchad, on 09/20/2008, -0/+9These CEOs probably think that they are doing nothing wrong. It's that irrational sense of undeserved entitlement. Most of these people have grown up in a culture where everything is easy and given to them. They get into the best colleges and get the best jobs based not on their merits, but on their connections.
If you want the poster boy for this culture, you have to look no further than our President, George W. - SarcasticJack, on 09/20/2008, -2/+11This is standard in our greedy society. Mo Money Mo Money Mo Money
Something tells me that if CEO's, Presidents, etc. drastically cut their own pay and pay there thousands of employees more in return, the economy would be in much better shape.
CEO's should be paid the most, but within reason. - mcgirt, on 09/20/2008, -1/+9I disagree that it would have happened with anyone at the helm. Wall Street tends to see successful companies as the result of a good CEO but when stuff like this happens they view it as a systemic failure and the guy just got unlucky. Warren Buffet has been saying for the last three years that the mortgage market was extremely risky and might implode. You can bet your ass if Warren was in charge of some of these companies there would have been a much better chance that they didn't go under.
- gridity, on 09/20/2008, -0/+8I've been a CEO - of a small company - and I agree, the job is 28462079% harder than most people think it is. But -that said - really we're not paid because it's *hard* work. *Manual labor* would be WAY harder work (for scrawny little old me) than running a company. But ...the way our culture works, people aren't paid based on how hard the work is or how much you suffer doing it. We're paid based on how many other people could do the job. It's just supply/demand really.
I learned this lesson in my teens when I switched from a cashiering job (which nearly anyone can do and is very tiring work to stand there in the same position for hours on end listening to beep beep beep all day...) to doing computer tutoring. Teaching people how to use their computers paid like 3 times as much, and it was way more pleasant and fun for me - sitting on a comfy couch, showing them cool tools and whatnot, sipping a soda, etc. But - the reason I got paid more ? Not because it was harder work, but because not as many people could do it. It was my knowledge they were paying for, not whether I was working hard.
CEO's are paid well because they know how to run companies and 99.9% of people do not know how to do that nor do they have the experience/expertise doing that. And the larger the company, the fewer the people who know how to deal with that level of leadership. Just because I was a CEO of a small company, doesn't qualify me to run something like Fannie Mae. I'd have to have way more experience and knowledge. Those who have backgrounds that would qualify them to run a company like that are few and far between. Hence, they make a TON of money. - inactive, on 09/20/2008, -4/+11almost everyone of those guys even look like slime balls
- sugarazor, on 09/20/2008, -1/+8I think your last paragraph just kinda made the point. These CEOs were reckless and not only did they run their own companies into the ground, they've run the American economy into the ground and guess who has to pay for it? Taxpayers. While the CEOs walk away with billions.
- bjornski, on 09/20/2008, -0/+7And also you can get forced out of HP, take your $40+mil in compensation, and then be a mouthpiece for the GOP, telling people how you'll tackle the problem of CEOs getting paid ridiculous amount of money for destroying companies.
- naturevalleyoat, on 09/20/2008, -1/+7We need a good old-fashioned tar-and-feathering for these people
- Demolama, on 09/20/2008, -1/+6Blame our tax code. These corporations get a bigger write off and save millions of dollars every year by putting money into the hands of their directors than they would if they placed it into the millions of their worker's hands. Like it or not it is better for business to give it to CEOs.
- NSResponder, on 09/20/2008, -1/+6"And which political party did all of these Captains of Industry belong to?"
The Ruling Party, of course. They make big campaign contributions to republicans and democrats alike, because they want manipulation of the tax code, and regulations to limit competition.
-jcr - L0rdChar0n, on 09/20/2008, -1/+6CEOs make that much for a great burden of responsibility: being in charge of a huge amount of resources and people (their employees), and making sure that the former is well invested while the latter is taken care of. I have no problem whatsoever with CEO wages being that high IF they bear the actual responsibility, which these CEOs didn't.
Responsibility is a two part deal: First, you have a goal and the power to go about it. Second (and more important), YOU ARE HELD RESPONSIBLE TO FACE THE CONSEQUENCES if you fail. These CEOs blatantly abused the first, and ignored the second, and THAT's the problem. Not that they make "obscene" amounts of money for what SHOULD be the most stressful jobs in the world, but rather that they did NOT do the job they needed to in order to deserve it, and don't face ANY consequences for their gross ignorance aside from bad press and a severance rather than a salary.
The government should simply take a majority of the bailout money back directly from them and their upper management, because the problem (and thus the responsibility) lies almost entirely on their shoulders. - vi0letruby, on 09/20/2008, -0/+5When Congress puts together the anticipated 'comprehensive' bailout plan, I hope these bad-boyz are factored in and freakin' pimp-slapped with frozen assets and a mandatory auction of *all* their properties. Rewards, after all, should be delivered in accordance to the actual pain or gain of companies under their watch and guidance, especially when seeking public financing after their piss-poor decisions. And the pay-back they provide should be infused back into paying back the massive debt the taxpayers will incur on their behalf. As*holes.
- mattearle, on 09/20/2008, -0/+5You are naive to think people are paid the amount they deserve. It is more like people are paid the amount they can and do demand.
- gridity, on 09/20/2008, -0/+5Yea, but he set it up to make his pay relative to how effective he is at making the company successful. Getting stock grants means nothing if the stock is in the toilet.
- jshooter1377, on 09/20/2008, -1/+5These bastards take advantage of everything. They make millions upon millions, yet, they want more! I'm just amazed that its taken this long for these CEO's to discover that they can get away with the equivalent of a mass murder...and the government is letting them do it! This "trickle down economy" is not working anymore, and hasn't for 20+ years. When you have the greediest sacks of ***** in the world running all the companies, no money, or at least not the full amount, 'trickles down' to the average person. Sure, there are those lucky few who play their cards right at the right time, but that doesn't mean *****.
They cut our salaries, outsource our jobs so we can't even complain about the cut salaries anymore, then, when their greed and douchebaggery catches up to them, the government rolls their eyes, pretends like nothing happened, and make us flip the bill for their rescue packages!
If you want to go even farther than that, some people can't even flip the bill because their jobs have been given to Prakash over in India or Huang in China! Then, they gotta start selling their belongings to put food on the table for their children and clothes on their back. Sooner or later, they run out of things to sell and ***** hits the fan... - jeffkee, on 09/20/2008, -2/+6How about Un-*****-Believable? Does that size up or would you like more?
- infiniphunk, on 09/20/2008, -1/+5Piss-poor example. cops often get rewarded with 'paid leave' for ***** up. It happens all the time.
- eschompthis, on 09/20/2008, -5/+9its douche chilling just to know that tax payers money is balling companies like these while the CEO gets millions...... oyeah i forgot im on digg, ***** McCain
- richmomz, on 09/20/2008, -0/+4Actually the bigger you screw up the MORE you get paid - default on $10,000 dollars in debt and your creditors will come down on you like a f-ing thunderbolt. Default on a 100 billion and everyone will fall all over themselves asking what they can do to help you out.
- browntiger, on 09/20/2008, -1/+5>Populist garbage.
Repuking trash. Since when been populist is an insult? I am trying to get my 401k out of s hole called Merrill. The only money they make is for themself. I love $100/year fee for a privilege of having an account with Merrill. I am not even talking about they terrible fund performance. - seltaeb4, on 09/20/2008, -1/+5Boy, things sure would be great right now if we had only privatized Social Security, just the way George Bush wanted.
- richmomz, on 09/20/2008, -1/+5"It's called the American Dream... because you have to be asleep to believe it!" -George Carlin
- ren1999, on 09/20/2008, -1/+5This is exactly what is wrong with U.S. business and the U.S. economy. Executives who are ruining their companies, sometimes on purpose for their "rival" friends, pay themselves large salaries and pay the people that do the actual work, trying to save their companies, very low salaries.
- Ramble, on 09/20/2008, -0/+4They all looked for the short term gains, assuming the current economic status (well, the one a few years ago) would remain. They succeeded where they wanted to, they made amazing short term gains and now they're paying for it.
- LenBaird, on 09/20/2008, -0/+4No, they probably knew they would be bailed out, or fired after raking in tens of millions, and all they needed to do was rape the company and the customers for every possible cent as quickly as possible, by predatory loans and cooked books, then jump ship and let someone else take the loss (the taxpayers).
Secondly, assuming your take on it is right, and mine is wrong; we should give them credit for convincing the Fed to transfer their losses to the taxpayers? After accepting tens of millions to run the company into the ground? Way to go boys! That's the American way! - LenBaird, on 09/20/2008, -0/+4You're right, when the area of their responsibility went down the tubes, they really got their asses handed to them.. they deserve all that money, because they "did the work" and took on the responsibility... Oh crap! Wait a second. They made millions, then jumped ship and let the taxpayers take the loss! Never mind.
- inactive, on 09/20/2008, -4/+7And guess who works with Obama now? Daniel Mudd and Jim Johnson, who had received a $21 million severance deal after stepping down as Fannie Mae CEO.
- jdepp, on 09/20/2008, -0/+3They need a swift bullet to the back of the head because:
a) They get paid enough during the good times to be insulated from any consequences of failure
b) They got appointed and they're anonymous components rather than building up the bank from square one, unlike genuine entrepreneurs Steve Jobs, or Richard Branson, or Bill Gates, who probably can justify what they earn on the grounds that there'd be no Apple or Virgin or MS without them. - sh0rtstop00, on 09/20/2008, -7/+10You are doing it wrong, Steve Jobs, for earning $1/year in salary!!!
- tnoy, on 09/20/2008, -1/+4Until you remember he's doing that so he's paying capitol gains taxes instead of the 35% he'd normally be paying.
- publiclurker, on 09/20/2008, -0/+3Considering the quality of their overseeing they could simply ask the bum under the nearest bridge to do the job. They couldn't do any worse, and the cost would just be an occasional bottle of MD50/50.
- RyFo18, on 09/20/2008, -5/+8As a CEO, I can't disagree that they deserve that amount of money...As for the fortune of their company, you have to blame it on terrible timing. Honestly whoever the CEO, the same thing would have happened.
- weech, on 09/20/2008, -2/+5Love, Steve J
- inactive, on 09/20/2008, -2/+5did you add those numbers up? Can you?
A couple hundred million is a drop in the bucket.
A few days interest on thier net worth. -
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