CEOs Earn More in A Day than Most Workers in A Year

[DuaneBidoux]

Source: Reuters

Top executives at major U.S. businesses last year made as much money in one day of work on the job as the average worker made over the entire year, according to a report released on Wednesday.

Chief executive officers from the nation's biggest businesses averaged nearly $11 million in total compensation, according to the 14th annual CEO compensation survey released jointly by the Institute for Policy Studies based in Washington and United for a Fair Economy, a national organization based in Boston.


Read more: http://www.cnbc.com/id/20493272

[Tyler Durden]

1. Assuming one makes >$40/hour.

I didn't start making that much until I was almost 50 years old.

Don't think that is an AVERAGE, more like a MEAN of some sort.

[dmallind]

5. Nah

11 million (which is total compensation) divided by say 240 working days is about $45.8K a year. To be a real comparison that would be $45.8K of total compensation for the employee too, so should include contribution to benefits and 401Ks etc, but even forgetting that and comparing total CEO compensation to only hourly wage that would be about $22 an hour.

Still an absurdly imbalanced situation of course, but looks an awful lot like they used median income to me.

[fed-up]

19. haven't checked math but should read-CEOs Earn More in A Day than Most Workers earn in THREE Years

[lonestarnot]

20. HELL NO!

[dmallind]

24. Again not quite

Remember this is not a black and white issue. By pointing out the need for corrcet math I am in no way justifying executive pay imbalance, but it's important to give credible and realistic data or our arguments will be less credible in turn.

If the average CEO compensation (and bear in mind we are talking about the average total compensation not just pay, and only among huge companies. The CEO of a 200 person medium sized company does not make this much by a long shot but I digress) is $11M then that's about $45.8K per working day.

Most workers do not make less than $16K a year. Too many do, but not most.

[SharonAnn]

6. These CEOs get "paid" this much. They don't "earn it" or "make it"

Let's get this framed properly. They are able to leverage influence and cronyism to get "paid" obscenely large amounts of money. Whether they do a good job or not, the company grows or not, the stock price increases or not, even if they get fired they get paid obscenely large amounts of money that is taken from the stockholders.

They don't "earn" it. They don't "make" it. Probably the best term is they "steal" it, but a more neutral term is that they get "paid" it.

Let's stop using the term "earn" in connection with this kind of payout. Evey time somebody uses the term "earn" with me in conversation about this kind of thing, I usually say something like "Well, he/she gets paid that much but I'm no so sure that he/she actually earns it." This has caused several people to pause and say, something like "Yeah, that's right."

Changing the "frame" is really important on this kind of thing. Think about these two questions:
1. "How does someone get paid so much?"
2. "How does someone earn so much?"

There's a difference in how they're likely to be answered.

[Trillo]

12. I like the terms "the 'Trickle Up' effect of wealth"

It's the opposite of what R.Reagan insisted when he claimed money trickled down -- people lower in the hierarchy trade their labor for money, so it's earned, it's not the product of some economic 'trickle effect'.

The Trickle Up effect seems to be the exponential nature of wealth and income distributions, merely looking at them and contemplating the why tends to disprove the idea of trickle down. Everyone in higher income levels takes a "cut" of all of those lower in the hierarchy.

Perhaps another frame that's more logical, is the 'cumulative skimming' effect. Skimming also rhymes with skinning.

Money Trickles Up, and has for centuries. Perhaps today's CEOs' outrageously imbalanced compensation is part of a hyper-expansionary bubble of debt-based money.

[Megahurtz]

14. Excellent Explaination.

So true and to the point. We've been duped and enslaved.

[Lasher]

35. Demand side economics

That is the label for the concept you have described. It has been around for a long time but the econimic principle has been largely buried ever since Saint Ronnie of Reagan came in to sell America out to the wealthiest 1%.

[ProudDad]

16. Don't SKIM over SharonAnn's post, Kids!

IT'S THE ESSENCE OF THIS ISSUE.

They DON'T EARN anything.

They are paid huge amounts by their corporate capitalist masters to keep up the bullshitting smokescreen that they "run" things.

It's true the best question is "How and Why does someone get paid so much (out of the wealth WE create)?"

[barbtries]

36. i've often found myself remarking

that there are 24 hours in a day - it's just not possible for one person's 24 hours to be worth that much more money. so, you are spot on. they just get paid that much

[HughBeaumont]

2. And each one thanks God every day that the wage slaves will do absolutely NOTHING about this.

Does running a company whose product you often had nothing to do with the invention or development of warrant you a lottery every year, no matter what your performance?

And should you get multiple MORE lotteries upon quitting or getting fired?

There are far too many people in the peasant class who have no problem with this whatsoever.

That, I guess, is the saddest part of all.

[Tyler Durden]

3. AND pay NOTHING for healthcare...

Mainly because the group rates are based on your EMPLOYEES, so THEY are usually paying the freight.

[scarletwoman]

41. "There are far too many people in the peasant class who have no problem with this whatsoever."

That's because the "peasants" have been entrained to believe that this is simply the way things are -- that there is no alternative. NO ONE with a public platform has ever told them that there might be something wrong with our system.

What they HAVE had pounded into their heads since birth is that capitalism is sacred. That raising any questions about it makes you a dirty pinko commie and a traitor to the U.S. of A.

When your life is a struggle to merely survive, when you find yourself at the mercy of forces you cannot comprehend or define -- because you have never been exposed to any dissenting views or meaningful analysis -- then the best you can do is to make whatever accomodation you are able to make, and hope that you can manage to keep your kids fed and sheltered.

It's not the fault of the "peasants": they have been very deliberately and systematically deprived of any kind of information that would shed light on the absurdity and injustice of their situation.

sw

[Name removed]

4. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[sutz12]

7. Now, if we could only get them to show up for work......

:evilgrin:

[PianoBlack]

8. This is so frustrating...

I am busting my arse in college right now trying to get a good degree in my field! I'm going for my Bachelors in Network Communications Management. That yields a 44k a year salary starting (apprx. Given different areas will have different averages on living costs and such.)

This means...that in almost 10 months I'll make what they make in BENEFITS! That's with me spending how many thousands of dollars a year on my education? and let's see...11 million in total compensation.... 28 years? That means that when I graduate in a year...I will make that much...by the time I'm 49.

...Great. That's comforting. Well...I suppose the important difference is that I will get to keep my soul. I won't have to sell it to some company and live an empty existence with lots of money.

[ozymandius]

9. Whatta ya mean: "earn"?

[Doctor_J]

10. that's because the workers are lazy and the CEO's are hard workers

:sarcasm:

[Bandit]

11. Exxon's NET PROFIT for the last several years has been over

One hundred million a day.....One hundred million dollars every single frigging dayPrice of gas was $1.46 per gallon on Jan 20th 2001...:shrug:

[daleo]

13. They have to be paid $11 million

Otherwise they might quit, for a job with better pay.

[ArbustoBuster]

21. Then we bring in cheap foreign CEOs to do the work the American CEOs won't do.

It's simple! :D

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

38. Ah!

:think:


Probably the fastest way to abandon this horseshit economic model.

[daleo]

39. You have a point

Funny how that never seems to happen...

[ProudDad]

15. I ALWAYS have a problem with the word "earn"

in a statement like that...

CEO's are the ultimate bullshit artists...

They don't know shit except how to talk bullshit...

It's who they know not what they know and that's a damn good thing for them since most of them don't know shit about anything real...

Most are there by virtue of who their parents were not by virtue of what they know or can do...

[ProudDad]

17. Y'all might be interested in this movie

"In Debt We Have Trusted"

How money is actually created and used to keep you in check...

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18205.htm

It's kinda paranoid but lots of good information is in it...

[GliderGuider]

18. Growing gap isn't news

Lots of good research found at Growing Gap.

Read this news article from December 2006.
http://growinggap.ca/node/48">No New Year’s hangover for top CEOs

By 12:13 pm on New Year’s Day, while many Canadians were still nursing a hangover, Canada’s 100 highest paid CEOs had already pocketed what will take minimum wage workers the rest of 2007 to earn.

The clock keeps ticking. By 9:46 am Jan. 2, as most Canadians begin another year of labour, Canada’s 100 highest paid CEOs will have reaped, on average, $38,010 in pay.

“That equals the average annual earnings of workers in Canada,” says Hugh Mackenzie, research associate with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA). “And it will take them all of 2007 to earn it.”

By the time Canadians tune into the 6:00 news Jan. 2, Canada’s 100 highest paid CEOs will have pocketed nearly $70,000. The highest paid CEO will have pocketed more than $570,000.

[Initech]

22. Correction: CEOs STEAL more in a day than most workers earn in a year.

They steal it by gutting the payroll, hiring cheap overseas labor, and gutting pension and retirement funds. It's criminal. THEY are the real mafia in this country.

[kestrel91316]

25. LOL, great minds think alike. See my post below.

[Initech]

27. Cool!

[kestrel91316]

23. Should read: CEOs STEAL more in a day than most workers earn

in a year. They don't EARN jack sh--. They are rich wastrels, almost down to the last one of them. They rob the workers, rob the shareholders, rob their customers, and rob the taxpayers (who have to pay extra taxes to make up for the taxes the rich get out of paying, as a special favor from lawmakers).

[classysassy]

26. Hard working

crooks take big chances in getting caught.Donate to the crooks in the rethug party,and shrub the head thug will pardon you.Don't forget donate TODAY.

[lovuian]

28. thats criminal

this whose Rich and poor system has to go

[NW_BEAST]

33. I always wondered

What our corperations would do if they faced even a smidge of the militant labor representation thats present in other countries HERE.

[Yavin4]

29. CEOs Are A Class To Themselves

It's the ultimate old boy network. Their number one job is to get Wall Street I-banks to buy the company stock, and it helps to have your Ivy League roomate run the mutual fund at Fidelity.

[roxnev]

30. Who is going to stop America from failing

When we started hating taxes, we brought it on ourselves, maybe the old timers where smarter, than we think, maybe the higher tax brackets help hold down inflation. Look at what doing away with the 90% bracket done, athletes selling them self to the highest bidder, in the love money more than America Race. now the poor can't afford to9 go to the ballgames, Americas hero's have become, who has the most money. America now has the doctors and dentist in the quest for being rich. C.E.O.s Getting paid so much that, that they fill the million air dream in one day, they do this by holding lower peasants, to a lower pay level. It has became a quest, to see who can fu@k America, the fastest with the mostest.

look at the Draft, Oh'boy an all volunteer army, My children will not have to die in a war, Fu@k America. The Army consists mostly of poor, most join to make a living, except for Pat Tillman, I don't know of any one else that joined, because the love for America. A lot joined for a chance to earn collage money. But wait even if you was drafted, when you got out of the army you had the GI bill, to rely on for education. but that went with the tax cuts. The latest on getting troops the chicken sh!t G.W Bush gave 20,000 dollars enlistment bonus. But now he needs 50 billion dollars, more to keep fighting the war.

The Republican with their borrow and spend will destroy us. So remember to vote for a tax spend Democrat That way you can look at your pay check stub and see what the Government cost. the Republican borrow and spend is all hidden. but you still have to pay for all the dollars they stole.

[Yavin4]

31. One Important Point That You Missed In Your Post

"the Republican borrow and spend is all hidden. but you still have to pay for all the dollars they stole."

We'll have to pay for all the dollars they stole...with interest.

[moondust]

32. Yes but they're holding up the sky.

Imagine the catastrophic consequences if one of them was to suddenly disappear! I can't even bear to think about it!

:sarcasm:

[barbtries]

34. i do A/R,

including the deposits for the company. i figured out that i make less than 1/2 of one percent of the gross receipts coming in...

and i am going through an eviction and planning a move across the country to a place i've never even visited to try to find an opportunity to make a better life for my son and myself.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

37. CEOs have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders

(this is a repost of my reply to a similar article over at the Editorial forum today that went nowhere)

The job of executives at "publicly traded companies" is to MAKE MONEY FOR THE SHAREHOLDERS - not to siphon it off for themselves in gigantic cookies that they take out of the cookie jar. Their shareholders get remaining crumbs and their employees and retirees get the crumbs of the crumbs.

They are taking money that rightfully should be plowed back in the form of capital improvements or research and development or to shore up those pension plans they are always asking for government bail-outs of or screwing their retirees out of.

They also "hide" compensation in the form of perks you don't even know about (Remember Jack Welch and the penthouse and the jets and the toilet paper?) as well as stock options.

All executive compensation should be in plain English in their prospectus along with perks and bennies and options so that someone buying their stock might say, "gee, I'm investing my dollars in this company in order to pay the CEO hundreds of millions of dollars so that I might get a measley return in dividends or I can pray the stock price goes up and I'm smart enough to sell before other people catch onto the Ponzi aspects of this."

They and the boards that approve this legal(?)looting should be hauled out in manacles for defrauding the stockholders. They are crooks!!They are also undermining the confidence in the stock market. These guys often get their gazillions regardless of how their companies do. Don't even get me started on the golden parachutes!

I don't care what privately held companies do. But I do think executive compensation in publicly held companies should be examined and yes, (gasp!) regulated. 100 times the average company salary would make the head of WalMart or any other company share the wealth with the employees and actually WANT them to be paid a decent wage. Any excess after operating expenses and capital improvements and R&D is PROFIT that should be distributed to the shareholders. They (the CEOs) can get their extra money in dividends in the company stock they own just like the rest of us.

[high density]

40. Reading annual reports really pisses me off

Every time my Lucent annual report came in the mail, I sat down and studied it to see the massive amount of money that the clowns in the upper rung of management were siphoning off the company as it was rotting away. It was just sickening. To think of all of the lost dividends because of this irresponsible behavior...

[scarletwoman]

42. k & r -- this is an important thread! (nt)

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

43. Yes, it is important. It's important that people wake up and recognize executive looting. nt.

[JerseygirlCT]

44. I think companies should be required to routinely report on one

figure: the ratio between the highest paid and lowest paid employee.

Would be telling, wouldn't it?

[scarletwoman]

45. That's a superb idea! Yes, it WOULD be "telling" -- so there's no way it will happen.

I should say, "there's no way it will happen" unless/until the People rise up and demand it.

sw

[Blue_Tires]

46. i actually thought the number was much higher

k+r

[antigop]

47. So let's all vote for the CEO candidates and allow the abuses to continue! n/t