Do CEO's deserve their huge Paychecks?

[andrewg]

Originally Posted By: ZZman
Pablo: So you are saying you don't have an idea what greedy might be for income?

I would be curious if any of these high paid CEO's give alot to charities or are philanthropists.

You are right Pablo. You can also be greedy for power, status and money.

So you like some finer things in life. No problem, it is your money to spend. But i bet you don't buy $ 10,000 bottles of booze and $ 5,000 pair of shoes etc...I bet your spending would be considered pretty normal to most people.

I am not complaining about high incomes. I am talking about ridiculous/outrageous incomes.

The end game would be to stop destroying the middle class and poor to feed the love of money of the rich and the overpaid CEO's.

With what they paid some of these guys they could have given 100's of workers good paying jobs and benefits. They could have sent employees to college to better themselves.

The benefits of the many should have more value than the benefit of the one.

The last line in your post is highly revealing of your beliefs. The 'collective'. A bankrupt idea that fails time and time again. The U.S. Constitution would beg to differ. Individual rights must prevail even when others disagree. In this country one has an individual right to earn as much as they can....or as little as they can. It's not about financial equality or what's 'fair' and 'deserving'. What you are promoting here has been written about, tried, and found to be more open to corruption than capitalism ever was. But....many still idolize Carl Marx.

 

[greenjp]

I don't think recognizing that imperfections in the economic and financial system of the country sometimes result in unjustified levels of pay for some members of society makes you a communist or a socialist or a marxist.

jeff

 

[CivicFan]

Originally Posted By: greenjp
I don't think recognizing that imperfections in the economic and financial system of the country sometimes result in unjustified levels of pay for some members of society makes you a communist or a socialist or a marxist.

jeff


+1 The cards are stacked against the vast majority of the Americans and it gets worse as the income inequality grows.

 

[Bryanccfshr]

Absolutely! DO you deserve yours?

Seriously. Everyone earns what there skills and market will bear. You can negotiate pay and perks if you have a marketable skill . CEO's just don't happen they grow into that pay by returning to their bosses on the investment.

If people were less concerned about who has more they may be able to do better for themselves.

 

[Tempest]

Quote:
I have to disagree. I am not driven by greed as are many others. We chose jobs for what they were not how much money we could make. I could go other places doing the same job and make more money but chose not to.


Is your government pension fully funded? Is it funded by money taken out of your pay check or by future taxpayers forced to pay into a pension ponzie scheme?

 

[motorguy222]

How are the cards stacked against the vast maority of Americans?

What is keeping "anyone" from doing and or becoming what they want?

I want real answers to the above questions,not excuses but real answers.

One of the real problems in America is the "state media" that keeps telling us that things are bad for everyone but the richest 1% of Americans.

Many have fallen for the class warefare ideology that we hear about over and over again,day after day,week after week.It is everywhere and it is nothing more than a tactic to bring people down and cause,class warefare.

Yes,there are those that have a hard time and there always will be.There are those that are in situations that are from their own doing and no matter what amount of money they make,they will be in a hard place.We have seen this over and over again from the Hollywood elite and others.

Many in the entertainment business have filed for bankruptcy over the years,even though these same people have made millions and millions of dollars.They have multi-million dollar homes and end up losing them.

The US is a place that if you want to 'really' succeed,you can.You may fail a time or five but if you keep trying,you can become a very wealthy person.

It may take years of work,just like many of the 'evil' CEO's have put forth but it can be and is done on a regular basis all over the country.

There are those that think that the CEO's make more than they should,I ask,according to who? Who decides how much money one should make?

The point could be made that a union worker that makes $20.00
an hour to sweep the floor makes too much.

Some may say that making $9.00 an hour to fry a burger at McDonalds is too much.

The point is,who here wants someone else telling them that they can only make 'X' amount of money? Who really wants to work long and hard for what they have only to have someone come and take it and give it to someone else?

I dont think that anyone wants these things but that is exactly what some are saying to do.

How is it fair for a person to work their way up only to have another to come and "TAKE" it from them so that it can be "GIVEN" to someone else that didnt earn it?

Dont get nme wrong.I am all for the programs that give help to those that need it,that is what it is there for.What I am not for is the idea that we all should make the same amount of money,live in the same type of house and drive the same kind of car.This thought process is Marxism and as has already been stated,doesnt work.

Marxism has failed over and over again.One reason it has failed is once you have taken and taken from one group to give to another,you end up with 'everyone' having nothing.When that happens,your whole process is at the point that it can no longer function.It then collapses,as we have seen over and over in history.

I would also like to add this.How many of those that call for 'equality' in pay are considered middle class or even,poor?

The 'party' that promotes this ideology has many that are millionaires themselves.They havent given up their millions,yet they want others to give up theirs.

Isnt this a red flag?

 

[Tempest]

Originally Posted By: ZZman
The over-seeing hand should be common sense but that is lacking today in some areas.

Honestly now...is anyone doing any job really worth more than maybe a million or so a year?


I hope you realize that all of those evil rich people are paying your salary and retirement since they pay the bulk of the taxes.

 

[andrewg]

Originally Posted By: greenjp
I don't think recognizing that imperfections in the economic and financial system of the country sometimes result in unjustified levels of pay for some members of society makes you a communist or a socialist or a marxist.

jeff

All systems have imperfections. Some, such as Marxism, are more than that. To try and create some utopia of equality does nothing more than take away individual freedom. Our forefathers knew that, but many here think they know better and use words and phrases such as 'common sense', 'unjustified', 'fairness', and 'reasonable'. Huge danger in advocating that....and then actually empowering an entity (government) the ability to do decide those matters. There is no perfect society where everybody has the same abilities, achieves the same level of financial success, or where 'fairness' prevails. Without incentive, without competition, and yes, without basically unhindered capitalism, a society will not benefit nor grow in a way that promotes the overall financial health of a nation.
And this business about the poor getting poorer etc.? Historically speaking our nations poor have gotten far less poor in the last eighty years. I guess it depends on what ones definition of 'poor' is. And by the way, class warfare and creating this animosity toward the wealthy plays right into the hands of those that want to take away our freedoms. We will all suffer for it if we subscribe to this imaginary utopia of equality.

 

[PandaBear]

Personally I'm not concern about those multi million dollar pay. After all some of the private business owners are making that much and some of the people on commission make that much by closing deals.

What I'm concern about is the golden parachute. Private business owners, sales, middle managers don't make more money doing a bad job and get fired, but CEOs and the similar rank executives do. This encourage bad behaviors and extreme risk taking (which drives bonus and stock prices in the short term) that bankrupts companies.

 

[Tempest]

Originally Posted By: ZZman

I don't expect everyone to agree with me that "controls" of some kind would work or are the answer. But I can't believe that anyone feels their compensation is rational or justified or deserved when compared to any other job. It is still just a job.

The government borrows 4 dollars for every 10 it spends. What on earth makes you think they are the least bit competent to determine "proper compensation" for the heads of business...that pay them taxes.

 

[greenjp]

It's interesting to see people respond to what they imagine other people are saying vs. what other people actually are saying.

jeff

 

[CivicFan]

Originally Posted By: greenjp
It's interesting to see people respond to what they imagine other people are saying vs. what other people actually are saying.

jeff


Yes, it's quite amusing but understandable.

But the key is that no one will learn anything at the end of the day.

 

[Tempest]

Quote:
The benefits of the many should have more value than the benefit of the one.


Just who exactly is deciding what those benefits are and defining who the "many" and "few" are? Where does your (taxpayer funded) total compensation land on the income scale?

 

[SteveSRT8]

It is ridiculous to even imagine that any of us somehow 'deserve' whatever someone else has!

Flawed thinking. Get out there and bust your chops and make something for yourself and your family. We're already in the process of finding out that we can't effectively redistribute wealth.

 

[CivicFan]

Originally Posted By: SteveSRT8
It is ridiculous to even imagine that any of us somehow 'deserve' whatever someone else has!

Flawed thinking. Get out there and bust your chops and make something for yourself and your family. We're already in the process of finding out that we can't effectively redistribute wealth.


But you are redistributing wealth by having a 343:1 ratio of a CEO:employee compensation. The wealth redistributed is something that belongs to people like me who are shareholders of said organizations.

 

[Tempest]

Originally Posted By: CivicFan

But you are redistributing wealth by having a 343:1 ratio of a CEO:employee compensation. The wealth redistributed is something that belongs to people like me who are shareholders of said organizations.


So now people buying things voluntarily with their own money on things they want has become "redistributing wealth". Oh how the language can be distorted.

 

[CivicFan]

Originally Posted By: Tempest
Originally Posted By: CivicFan

But you are redistributing wealth by having a 343:1 ratio of a CEO:employee compensation. The wealth redistributed is something that belongs to people like me who are shareholders of said organizations.


So now people buying things voluntarily with their own money on things they want has become "redistributing wealth". Oh how the language can be distorted.


They are taking that money from my pocket and putting it in the CEO's pocket. That is what is known as "a redistribution of wealth".

For some CEO-s I don't mind. But a large portion of them (the most vivid one in my portfolio being Citi) are bums who do not deserve it.

 

[mechanicx]

Originally Posted By: CivicFan
But you are redistributing wealth by having a 343:1 ratio of a CEO:employee compensation. The wealth redistributed is something that belongs to people like me who are shareholders of said organizations.


That's what I don't get about people who say things like, "who should decide how much some one else should make?" and the "CEO pays your wages and taxes". Both of which couldn't be more wrong and backwards. CEO's have no problem setting all the employees salary and benefits very low and workload high. But no one chould dare question the CEO's salary or worth. And the CEO doesn't pay anyone else salary or taxes. They take their cut out of the revenue that was earned by all the company's employees. Just because someone pays you $7/hr doesn't mean you weren't productive and didn't earn the business possibly up to $100's of dollars per hour. If anything, you help pay the CEO's wages and taxes rather than the other way around. Another favorite is, "No one else can do the CEO's job". That's very questionable. A lot of times the CEO can't and wouldn't do the line level employees job at 3x the going rate.

Many times a lot of today's CEOs make their money through taking it out of their employees and customers. One other thing, I just like how they stockpile millions and billions of dollars, then eventually give it to charity, to avoid taxes and get their name put on a building or foundation. If you want to be charitable give back to your employees who actually earned it and maybe they can be charitable.

 

[Tempest]

Originally Posted By: CivicFan

They are taking that money from my pocket and putting it in the CEO's pocket. That is what is known as "a redistribution of wealth".

CEO's cannot take money from your pocket.

 

[CivicFan]

Originally Posted By: Tempest
Originally Posted By: CivicFan

They are taking that money from my pocket and putting it in the CEO's pocket. That is what is known as "a redistribution of wealth".

CEO's cannot take money from your pocket.


What you quote says 'they' (meaning more than one persons). In this case, 'they' stands for the "board of directors".