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CEO pay vs average worker pay

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by Gehrig, May 24, 2013.

  1. Alma

    Alma Well-Known Member

    Shit, what's his plan? And if he doesn't earn 10 percent more, did he fuck up? And if he does, was it his native intelligence who derived a solution that no one else could figure out?
     
  2. TheSportsPredictor

    TheSportsPredictor Well-Known Member

    What's this CEO worth?

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/24/abercrombie-sales-ceo-controversy_n_3332601.html
     
  3. doctorquant

    doctorquant Well-Known Member

    Baron would cut executive compensation and use the money saved to make sure that people in its discontinued MP3 download operations get to keep their jobs. That'd beef up that bottom line a bunch ...
     
  4. jackfinarelli

    jackfinarelli Well-Known Member


    I did not move the goalposts. I used the yardstick that you chose to use here which was "winning the genetic lottery". People who win it - whether the lottery involves athleticism, intellect, marketing intuition, drive, whatever - do better in life than people who lose that lottery.

    The CEOs won their version of the lottery and get paid a ton of money. Athletes won their version of the lottery and get paid a ton of money. Some musicians won their version of the lottery and get paid a ton of money. I did not win any of those lotteries, I never came close to making a ton of money.

    The question posed at the outset here was how to justify the gap in earnings. I am not sure that one can justify it and I am not sure that there is much one can do to rectify it.
     
  5. micropolitan guy

    micropolitan guy Well-Known Member

    All the traffic will bear. They are the chosen elite. Even the failures like Fiorino and Hurd, who helped run HP into the ground, deserved the millions and millions they received in severance pay for a job poorly done. Let the workers eat cake. Or better yet, outsource their jobs and don't pay them at all.
     
  6. DocTalk

    DocTalk Active Member

    The CEO is always under pressure to perform. Sometimes, that lackluster performance is allowed to slide because the board of directors does not have the initiative to intervene (see A Rod, Roberts Luongo). Sometimes the CEO's head rolls. Proctor and Gamble just fired the CEO without a severance package because of earnings and growth misses. makes me like the PG board very much.
     
  7. Baron Scicluna

    Baron Scicluna Well-Known Member

    Invest more in your online business. Offer some items only available online, or better deals if you buy online. You hire some smart people with your $466 billion in net profit from just one year to come up with the next gadget, whatever it may be.

    You crowdsource your investors. They expect larger growth. Ask them for ideas. See what they have to offer.

    Because you're up 15-0. The other team scores a run or two, yeah, your margin will be smaller. You'll still winning the game by a bunch.

    Unlike, say, the person who risks all of their money (as opposed to getting a loan from Mommy and Daddy), and spends their time and sweat building up their own company. They fuck up, they're out of business, and their future and their kids' is screwed.

    Mike Duke fucks up, the shareholders toss him out with his multimillion dollar golden parachute and a bunch of employees that he doesn't give a shit about end up collecting unemployment. Joe Schmoe fucks up, he's on the street living in his car with his wife and kids. Now that's pressure. That's what I mean by how much easier it is to grow an already successful company as opposed to building one from scratch, which is what you were talking about in your original post.
     
  8. Stoney

    Stoney Well-Known Member

    You know, that Wal Mart example is hardly the most shocking illustration of the disparity trend, in part because I believe it only takes into account the wages of their American workers. It gets far worse when you consider who's manufacturing those products. For example, de facto slave labor being paid less than 40 dollars PER MONTH in Bangladeshi death trap sweat shops to produce name brand clothing of companies where the executives make millions.

    I certainly understand the market principles alleged to be driving the trend, but sorry, the extent to which the disparity continues to multiply each year defies logic. Free market principles don't explain why the disparity has multiplied nearly ten fold since 1982. They don't explain why it continues to multiply even during bad economic times, or why CEOs continue to get enormous raises even when their companies had bad years and/or lose money--there's nothing rational about that.
     
  9. Stoney

    Stoney Well-Known Member

    So were CEOs not "under pressure to perform" in the 50s, 60s 70s and 80s? They didn't face consequences back then?

    Is there any evidence that CEOs in the 80s, when they merely made 42 times what they paid their workers, were any less competent than the ones today making 354 times? Sure wouldn't think so from the economic news, as our global economic standing was considerably higher back then.
     
  10. YankeeFan

    YankeeFan Well-Known Member

    Mike Duke had been with Walmart for 13 years when he was named CEO. He had previously served as president and CEO of Walmart USA and was vice chairman of Walmart International at the time he got the top job.

    He played a big part in their growth. So, to say he started on third base is -- well, off-base.
     
  11. Batman

    Batman Well-Known Member

    That's the part that always bugs me when these debates start. People like Baron always assume the CEO didn't work hard to get there, didn't pay his dues, didn't put in the time and effort to work his way to the top.
    Could Mike Duke walk into a Wal-Mart in Springfield, Mo., and work a register? Probably not. But the people working in that Wal-Mart couldn't step in and do what he does, either. They're on two different career tracks, with two different skill sets and two different ceilings. The grunt-level employees might be able to run a store one day, but they probably won't be talented enough to steer national and international development. That takes an entirely different level of training and experience, and it's worth it to Wal-Mart and other companies to pay a higher premium to people with those skills.
    It's kind of like the army. There are generals and there are privates, and there's a reason why both of them are where they are,
     
  12. schiezainc

    schiezainc Well-Known Member

    Look, I don't want to seem like I'm on the side of the rich person/CEO but, last time I checked, we lived in a country where everyone was free to pursue the best career available for them.
    Would I like to make millions of dollars each year? Absolutely.
    But no one is forcing me to scratch out a living as a wedding photographer. I chose to do that and just because someone else makes more than me doesn't mean it should be any other way.
    I'm free to get a job that makes as much money as I want to, just as someone else is.
    The way I see it, some people work their butts off and go through school and climb the corporate ladder and ultimately become CEOs and make millions of dollars. Sure, some others might get lucky and get in a position like that because of the family they were brought up in or the environment they were raised in but that's the way life works.
    Things aren't always fair. Deal with it.
     
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