“Now we know why CEOs didn’t want this data released,”

[coloradoatheist]

One of their talents, which we're not supposed to talk about, is their ability to lay off unneeded uncompetitive workers who cost the company more than they're worth, also to resist pressure for higher wages.

No that is the last resort of a scumbag without any ideas.

If you have labor and cannot find something productive for them to do then you have failed at leadership.

CULT OF PERSONALITY.

Not always, if demand drastically drops for your product you will need to do something. After the mortgage there would need to be a reduction. It's also one area where you version would like to drive any efficiencies.

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Many CEO's are probably good managers within the context in which they operate, but this still does not justify their overblown salaries and bonuses.

It's unfortunate but shareholders (who are clueless 99% of time) are ultimately OK with that. But CEO compensation of big companies is usually pretty inconsequential as far as overall company spendings is concerned. Speaking of shareholders, I personally had indirect interaction with a scam artist CEO/company, and I can tell you, these shareholders are raging idiots, once you get their money they will stay with you no matter what.
At one AGM (annual general meeting) their CEO threatened suing me and other fairly anonymous critics for calling him names

Not true. Most large shareholders that will care are fund managers and other institutional investors. They do care about the performance of the CEO and can easily affect the market. They will remove ineffective leadership. The tenure for CEO is usually not very long.

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That is a good description of many CEO's, who run a company into the ground, cause untold hardship for countless people, collect their bonuses and move on to greener pastures. Pity they don't get the boot long before that stage.

True, but a lot of old and fat companies find themselves in the situation where they need "restructuring" and some CEOs are specialized in just that - going in and firing lots of people who, truth to be told, are dead weight. Some (smaller companies) CEOs may find it hard to fire people they have known for a long time, better hire someone outside.

Many CEO's are probably good managers within the context in which they operate, but this still does not justify their overblown salaries and bonuses.

I think we should compare the top 225 athletes in all the major sports and see who wins with the CEOs. it would be close I bet.

 

[barbos]

Not always, if demand drastically drops for your product you will need to do something. After the mortgage there would need to be a reduction. It's also one area where you version would like to drive any efficiencies.

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Many CEO's are probably good managers within the context in which they operate, but this still does not justify their overblown salaries and bonuses.

It's unfortunate but shareholders (who are clueless 99% of time) are ultimately OK with that. But CEO compensation of big companies is usually pretty inconsequential as far as overall company spendings is concerned. Speaking of shareholders, I personally had indirect interaction with a scam artist CEO/company, and I can tell you, these shareholders are raging idiots, once you get their money they will stay with you no matter what.
At one AGM (annual general meeting) their CEO threatened suing me and other fairly anonymous critics for calling him names

Not true. Most large shareholders that will care are fund managers and other institutional investors. They do care about the performance of the CEO and can easily affect the market. They will remove ineffective leadership. The tenure for CEO is usually not very long.

I had smaller companies and startups in mind. But big companies are not immune to executive stupidities. HP once had former typist/secretary raised to CEO position. Large company CEOing is 99% connections.

 

[coloradoatheist]

Not always, if demand drastically drops for your product you will need to do something. After the mortgage there would need to be a reduction. It's also one area where you version would like to drive any efficiencies.

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Not true. Most large shareholders that will care are fund managers and other institutional investors. They do care about the performance of the CEO and can easily affect the market. They will remove ineffective leadership. The tenure for CEO is usually not very long.

I had smaller companies and startups in mind. But big companies are not immune to executive stupidities. HP once had former typist/secretary raised to CEO position. Large company CEOing is 99% connections.

I thought you said anyone can run a company? Which one are you referring to?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

There should be a sliding scale of tax breaks. The bigger the gap, the more the corp has to pay into social services. Stick to 100x and you get no penalties.

You would just get a lot of subcontracting. Some companies already work that way--only a small core, everything else contracted out. Coke doesn't produce any coke.

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Some of it really is obscene. I can't think why anyone would be worth such an obscene amount of money.

Nobody seems to have any problems with athletes and musicians and actors having such obscene amounts of money. I've never really been able to figure out why it's okay for artists and entertainers, but not for businesspeople. It seems like the same perspective should apply to any ridiculously wealthy person, regardless of how that wealth was attained.

Because the people doing the complaining can see that the entertainers are very good. They can't see that the CEOs are likewise the ones that are the best at what they do.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You could go out in the street grab the first person you saw and have as much success with them.

These people have no talent beyond being able to bullshit.

How many CEOs do you know? And how much do you know about what CEOs do?

They are ordinary humans beings.

Very gregarious. Politicians.

Nothing else very special.

They exist because humans are not very far removed from kings and the delusions of leaders with special powers and insight.

Since college I have never been more than two steps away from the CEO. My current job is the only one where I don't routinely talk to the CEO.

None have been gregarious. None have been politicians.

One telling incident with the one I used to work for:

I showed him my copy of Railroad Tycoon. He played it on my system for 12 hours that day, then the next morning went out and got his own copy. He really enjoyed trying to make the most efficient network and he was very good at it.

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It is called living and seeing these people and listening to them.

Does this mean that you have personally interacted with CEOs, and have discussed what their jobs entail with them? Do you have first-hand interactions with CEOs?

Have you personally interacted with CEOs at the lofty level of making thousands of dollars per hour?

View attachment 15728

Whoever wrote that crap didn't think.

Spread that CEO pay over the workers and see how much of a raise it produces.

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It is called living and seeing these people and listening to them.

Does this mean that you have personally interacted with CEOs, and have discussed what their jobs entail with them? Do you have first-hand interactions with CEOs?

I have listened to them being interviewed and answering questions. I read their writings.

It is sales jargon and nothing else.

They are usually very charming.

CULT OF PERSONALITY.

In other words, you know nothing.

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There should be a sliding scale of tax breaks. The bigger the gap, the more the corp has to pay into social services. Stick to 100x and you get no penalties.

Why tax the corporations, who can just restructure to avoid the taxes? Far better to tax individual income.

Close the loopholes on personal income; set a few new tax brackets above the existing structure, and apply very high rates to the top brackets. A person earning $10,000,000 per annum pays less than 40% on earnings over half a million dollars. He can afford to pay (for example)80% tax on income above $1m, 90% above $5m, and 99% above $8m. He's not going to go hungry. And if the top rates are sufficiently high, they set an effective ceiling on earnings.

No, they set a threshold beyond which you get huge tax evasion.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Not always, if demand drastically drops for your product you will need to do something. After the mortgage there would need to be a reduction. It's also one area where you version would like to drive any efficiencies.

Labor theory of value!

If you know what you're doing you can always find a productive use for labor.

Never mind whether you have anything like the tools needed, that's just a capitalist deception.

 

[Emily Lake]

Have you personally interacted with CEOs at the lofty level of making thousands of dollars per hour?

Yes. I don't want their job, it's incredibly stressful and there's a lot riding on their decisions. Many CEOs make truly exorbitant incomes... and several of them do seem obscene to me, but having interacted with very highly paid CEOs and having insight into the kinds of decisions they have to make and the breadth of information they need to be able to consider... I don't really complain about it all that much.

Care to name names/companies?

Prefer not to.

 

[Emily Lake]

Penneys, Macys, and Walmart, all from the meme above are all in the process of closing stores. Sounds like their CEOs are making great decisions.

It's always a possibility. There's no guarantee that a CEO will always make good decisions, but there's also no guarantee that even consistently good decisions can inure a company against a changing environment and competitive pressure.

On a broader note... it might be worth considering the sheer volume of important decisions made by CEOs on a daily basis. As a manager, I make key decisions maybe once a month, generally around prioritization and intake of work for my team. My Director makes key decisions on the order of once a week - not just in terms of prioritization and work intake, but also in terms of investments and strategic direction for our department, with consideration for the impact of those decisions to the long-term health of the company. My CFO makes multiple decisions daily about prioritization of work, strategy, and investments for both long term and short term objectives, affecting the work and resources of a large portion of the company, and balances competing objectives and strategies across a wide variety of topics that all interrelate. My CEO does all of that and more, every day, for the entire company, across all aspects of our business.

In short, I make important decisions on behalf of my company maybe once a month. My CEO makes important decisions on behalf of my company maybe once every two hours.

 

[barbos]

Not always, if demand drastically drops for your product you will need to do something. After the mortgage there would need to be a reduction. It's also one area where you version would like to drive any efficiencies.

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Not true. Most large shareholders that will care are fund managers and other institutional investors. They do care about the performance of the CEO and can easily affect the market. They will remove ineffective leadership. The tenure for CEO is usually not very long.

I had smaller companies and startups in mind. But big companies are not immune to executive stupidities. HP once had former typist/secretary raised to CEO position. Large company CEOing is 99% connections.

I thought you said anyone can run a company? Which one are you referring to?

I did not say that. I don't remember her name, I remember she died from cancer. HP has had a lot of women CEOs.
None of them had background in computer/electronics.

 

[Emily Lake]

And yet, despite all the money involved, the boards of directors of these companies WHO DO interact with lots of CEOs can't seem to be able to distinguish the difference between the good CEOs and the bad CEOs-- the good decisions and the bad decisions. What does that tell you?

It tells me that humans are really, really, really bad at distinguishing between a bad decision and a bad outcome. Most decisions have an element of uncertainty to them. Making a good decision means making the best decision, with the most reasonable expected outcome, based on the information available at the time the decision is made. That makes for a good decision... but it's still no guarantee of a good outcome. There are a lot of good CEOs who still experience bad outcomes. There are also, unsurprisingly, a fair number of bad CEOs who experience good outcomes. It can be difficult to tell the difference, especially if the information being used to make decisions isn't transparent to observers.

I'll tell you what that means to ME. It means that every company that fails was lead by a failure who wasn't worth the money the company invested in him/her. It tells me that the failure CEOS are indistinguishable from successful CEOs. It tells me that all the standards, skill sets, and attributes companies are using to select their CEOs are meaningless. Because there appears to be no accurate measure of the quality of a CEO until they are given the reins of a company, this means that I or YOU might very well be exactly as successful at running a company as any proven successful CEO out there. And that means that the work that successful CEOs perform, might be more demanding, (I don't know about that, I work pretty hard in my profession) but it isn't necessarily more difficult, or specialized than the work that goes on in any other skilled occupation.

I know that I would NOT be successful at being the CEO of a large company. I know quite well that I don't have sufficient knowledge and experience to do so effectively. I'm farily close to being an expert in my field... and I've got a relatively broad understanding of my industry. A CEO doesn't need to be an expert in actuarial science... but they do need to be proficient and conversant with nearly every aspect of their company and their industry.

 

[Emily Lake]

CEO's are in a highly responsible position and should be paid well for their work, but not at their current rates and bonuses.
The ratio between those at the top and the rest of us has gotten way out of hand. To the point of obscenity.

I'm surprised that there is, generally speaking, no real sense of outrage. Or any apparent likelihood of addressing the issue in the foreseeable future.

There's not as much outrage, because your generality isn't actually true. A relatively small number of CEOs make obscene amounts of money for their jobs, but most don't. There are a LOT of small and mid-sized companies that get left off of that measure. There was a link posted earlier... the average effective hourly rate for CEOs is less than the average effective hourly rate for primary care doctors. And given that there's a relatively small number of CEOs making exorbitant salaries... that means that there are a whole lot of CEOs who make less than your family doctor does.

 

[arkirk]

Tom Brady makes the same amount as the link for one of the CEOs and he just throws a brown leather thing around for fun. And Brady is the 12th highest paid quarterback.

Pointing to OTHER STUPIDITIES doesn't excuse those that exploit our economic system mercilessly.

 

[dismal]

So, if I were hiring a CEO (which I do actually do in my job), why would I want one who is a politician who lies to me?

Not to you, to other people. You hire CEO to lie to other people for profit.

When we hire CEOs we never actually consider how good they are at "lying to people for profit".

Frankly, I'm not even sure what that means, or why it would be a good quality for a CEO to have. We tend to look for the opposite: honesty and integrity etc.

 

[coloradoatheist]

Tom Brady makes the same amount as the link for one of the CEOs and he just throws a brown leather thing around for fun. And Brady is the 12th highest paid quarterback.

Pointing to OTHER STUPIDITIES doesn't excuse those that exploit our economic system mercilessly.

Huh? It's comparing people that just throw a brown ball around to a person that provides for the economy and provides things for people. I love sports, but we wouldn't be worse off if we didn't have football.

 

[ZiprHead]

Penneys, Macys, and Walmart, all from the meme above are all in the process of closing stores. Sounds like their CEOs are making great decisions.

It's always a possibility. There's no guarantee that a CEO will always make good decisions, but there's also no guarantee that even consistently good decisions can inure a company against a changing environment and competitive pressure.

On a broader note... it might be worth considering the sheer volume of important decisions made by CEOs on a daily basis. As a manager, I make key decisions maybe once a month, generally around prioritization and intake of work for my team. My Director makes key decisions on the order of once a week - not just in terms of prioritization and work intake, but also in terms of investments and strategic direction for our department, with consideration for the impact of those decisions to the long-term health of the company. My CFO makes multiple decisions daily about prioritization of work, strategy, and investments for both long term and short term objectives, affecting the work and resources of a large portion of the company, and balances competing objectives and strategies across a wide variety of topics that all interrelate. My CEO does all of that and more, every day, for the entire company, across all aspects of our business.

In short, I make important decisions on behalf of my company maybe once a month. My CEO makes important decisions on behalf of my company maybe once every two hours.

Do they make those decisions on their own or do they use input and data obtained and compiled by those below them?

 

[coloradoatheist]

Penneys, Macys, and Walmart, all from the meme above are all in the process of closing stores. Sounds like their CEOs are making great decisions.

It's always a possibility. There's no guarantee that a CEO will always make good decisions, but there's also no guarantee that even consistently good decisions can inure a company against a changing environment and competitive pressure.

On a broader note... it might be worth considering the sheer volume of important decisions made by CEOs on a daily basis. As a manager, I make key decisions maybe once a month, generally around prioritization and intake of work for my team. My Director makes key decisions on the order of once a week - not just in terms of prioritization and work intake, but also in terms of investments and strategic direction for our department, with consideration for the impact of those decisions to the long-term health of the company. My CFO makes multiple decisions daily about prioritization of work, strategy, and investments for both long term and short term objectives, affecting the work and resources of a large portion of the company, and balances competing objectives and strategies across a wide variety of topics that all interrelate. My CEO does all of that and more, every day, for the entire company, across all aspects of our business.

In short, I make important decisions on behalf of my company maybe once a month. My CEO makes important decisions on behalf of my company maybe once every two hours.

Do they make those decisions on their own or do they use input and data obtained and compiled by those below them?

Not Emily, but it's both. But that's the mark of a good leader and manager, knowing what to use and how from the people who want to do it.

 

[ZiprHead]

So let me get this straight. We have people here trying to justify these obscene wages?

 

[Elixir]

Penneys, Macys, and Walmart, all from the meme above are all in the process of closing stores. Sounds like their CEOs are making great decisions.

It's always a possibility. There's no guarantee that a CEO will always make good decisions, but there's also no guarantee that even consistently good decisions can inure a company against a changing environment and competitive pressure.

On a broader note... it might be worth considering the sheer volume of important decisions made by CEOs on a daily basis. As a manager, I make key decisions maybe once a month, generally around prioritization and intake of work for my team. My Director makes key decisions on the order of once a week - not just in terms of prioritization and work intake, but also in terms of investments and strategic direction for our department, with consideration for the impact of those decisions to the long-term health of the company. My CFO makes multiple decisions daily about prioritization of work, strategy, and investments for both long term and short term objectives, affecting the work and resources of a large portion of the company, and balances competing objectives and strategies across a wide variety of topics that all interrelate. My CEO does all of that and more, every day, for the entire company, across all aspects of our business.

In short, I make important decisions on behalf of my company maybe once a month. My CEO makes important decisions on behalf of my company maybe once every two hours.

So maybe your CEO deserves 60x your pay? Maybe, but my experience as a business owner tells me that while the decisions your CEO makes are likely informed by legions (or at least several) "front-line" or middle-upper management employees who can bring him/her facts and reports. So he can listen for a few minutes, make a decision and not even have to write it down or provide rationale prior to the next shareholders' meeting. You, OTOH, are more likely to be required to assemble all the information bearing on your decisions yourself or with minimal help. Then consider that the CEOs at large companies are making 500 to 1000+ times entry level wages. Nobody deserves that - sorry.
When we sold the Company where I still work in January of this year, top level pay was less than 5x what we paid entry level personnel. What we as owners received, above and beyond the salaries we were drawing, amounted to little more than 20 years' entry level pay, and we each have over 10 years invested in the Company. We CREATED the Company, defined its mission, established our niche and our vision - then did all the heavy lifting to make it profitable. I mean including the LITERAL heavy lifting - setting up warehouse shelves, re-building the operating space, framing, sheetrock and painting on weekends, designing and building the computer network, lugging tradeshow displays across vast show floors etc. etc.. I sincerely doubt that your CEO did any of that, and more power to him/her if (s)he did.
I feel that my partners and I deserved the proceeds from the sale of the Company, and probably more. But NEVER 1000x what we were willing to pay our employees.

 

[coloradoatheist]

So let me get this straight. We have people here trying to justify these obscene wages?

The one of a guy throwing a football around?

 

[ZiprHead]

So let me get this straight. We have people here trying to justify these obscene wages?

The one of a guy throwing a football around?

Isn't it CEOs that decided the football player needed to make that money?

Oh, and BTW, nice dodge of the question. You scramble like a quarterback.