AFL-CIO PayWatch: CEO Pay Hits 'Insane Level'

[Newsjock]

http://www.aflcio.org/Blog/Corporate-Greed/PayWatch-CEO-Pay-Hits-Insane-Level

It’s good to be a CEO, at least paywise. According to the 2014 AFL-CIO Executive PayWatch, released today, it’s 331 times better to be a CEO than an average worker. PayWatch finds that the average CEO of an S&P 500 company pocketed $11.7 million in 2013, while the average worker earned $35,293. The gap between CEOs and minimum wage workers is more than twice as wide—774 times.

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said that PayWatch: "Calls attention to the insane level of compensation for CEOs, while the workers who create those corporate profits struggle for enough money to take care of the basics."

While CEO pay has hit stratospheric levels, workers and their families have been left in an economic quagmire of stagnant wages, expiration of unemployment insurance for long-term jobless workers, an abysmally low minimum wage and unequal pay between men and women.

Many of the CEOs highlighted in PayWatch head companies, such as Walmart, that are notorious for paying low wages. This year PayWatch highlights five low-wage companies through stories from workers at Walmart, Kellogg’s, Reynolds American , Darden Restaurants and T-Mobile.

http://www.aflcio.org/Corporate-Watch/Paywatch-2014