The Laborer is worthy of his hire. 1 Timothy 5:18
I would assert that executives are overpaid. I would contend that underpaying labor is contrary to the words of the Bible. I would argue that the wage and income gap represents a very real failure for labor to have genuine equality of pay for work. This is what the 99% is unhappy about in the Occupy movement.
They do NOT receive their compensation on merit; they do not receive their compensation packages at the discretion of the real owners of the business they work for - the stockholders. They used to receive far less during earlier periods where they were arguably as important if not more important for fulfilling their roles as executives. Now executives are handing each other excessive pay, bonuses and benefits, even when they make disastrous decisions that ruin companies.
That should be contrary to real, legitimate capitalism.
Any doubts - look at the bonuses paid to the executives at the companies receiving bail outs. It is true even when they do clearly dishonest and risky things - like altering the LIBOR rate or falsifying credit ratings.
From earlier this year at the LA Times:
I would assert that executives are overpaid. I would contend that underpaying labor is contrary to the words of the Bible. I would argue that the wage and income gap represents a very real failure for labor to have genuine equality of pay for work. This is what the 99% is unhappy about in the Occupy movement.
They do NOT receive their compensation on merit; they do not receive their compensation packages at the discretion of the real owners of the business they work for - the stockholders. They used to receive far less during earlier periods where they were arguably as important if not more important for fulfilling their roles as executives. Now executives are handing each other excessive pay, bonuses and benefits, even when they make disastrous decisions that ruin companies.
That should be contrary to real, legitimate capitalism.
Any doubts - look at the bonuses paid to the executives at the companies receiving bail outs. It is true even when they do clearly dishonest and risky things - like altering the LIBOR rate or falsifying credit ratings.
From earlier this year at the LA Times:
U.S. CEO's pay 231 times higher than that of average workers
So much for the new austerity.
The average U.S. chief executive earned more than $11 million last year in salary, stock options and other compensation, according to a new analysis by the Economic Policy Institute. That’s about 231 times more, on average, than workers.
That ratio has shrunk a bit since the height of the dot.com bubble, when a ballooning stock market inflated CEO compensation to 411 times that of working stiffs.
And it’s smaller than the pay gap calculated recently by the AFL-CIO, the umbrella federation of unions representing about 12 million U.S. workers. Their analysis concluded that the typical CEO of an S&P 500 Index company made 380 times the average wages of U.S. workers in 2011.
Whatever. What's clear is that the pay gap between U.S. CEOs and rank-and-file workers is higher than anywhere else in the developed world. And it has been accelerating over the last few decades. In 1965, the U.S. CEO-to-worker compensation ratio was roughly 20 to 1.
Here are some additional stats to put the oh! in CEO:
Bottom line: It pays to be CEO.
********************
And yet at the same time, we have some of the highest productivity. In the list of GDP/per hour worked, we were 4th, after Norway, Luxembourg and the Netherlands, and just ahead of Belgium, France, Ireland, Germany, Austria and Australia. You know - those mostly European countries that Romney and Ryan don't want us to be like.
Perhaps a better visual of what has happened to labor and wages, in spite of strong, steady increases in productivity, in contrast to that spike of 725% of executive compensation since 1978 is this:
Just to put this all in a visual perspective, here are some graphs from the Mother Jones article, Overworked Americans.
In the past 20 years, the US economy has grown nearly 60 percent. This huge increase in productivity is partly due to automation, the internet, and other improvements in efficiency. But it's also the result of Americans working harder—often without a big boost to their bottom lines. Oh, and meanwhile, corporate profits are up 20 percent.
And for those of you who buy into the false notion that union workers are overpaid.......compared to management, and especially CEOs and other C-class (CFO, etc.), look at this:
Non-union workers: $37,284
This reflects the growing gap in wealth and income between the 1% and the 99%.
The average U.S. chief executive earned more than $11 million last year in salary, stock options and other compensation, according to a new analysis by the Economic Policy Institute. That’s about 231 times more, on average, than workers.
That ratio has shrunk a bit since the height of the dot.com bubble, when a ballooning stock market inflated CEO compensation to 411 times that of working stiffs.
And it’s smaller than the pay gap calculated recently by the AFL-CIO, the umbrella federation of unions representing about 12 million U.S. workers. Their analysis concluded that the typical CEO of an S&P 500 Index company made 380 times the average wages of U.S. workers in 2011.
Whatever. What's clear is that the pay gap between U.S. CEOs and rank-and-file workers is higher than anywhere else in the developed world. And it has been accelerating over the last few decades. In 1965, the U.S. CEO-to-worker compensation ratio was roughly 20 to 1.
Here are some additional stats to put the oh! in CEO:
-- 725%: That's how much average CEO compensation increased between 1978 and 2011, according to EPI.
-- 5.7%: That’s how much the average worker’s compensation increased over the same period.
Bottom line: It pays to be CEO.
********************
And yet at the same time, we have some of the highest productivity. In the list of GDP/per hour worked, we were 4th, after Norway, Luxembourg and the Netherlands, and just ahead of Belgium, France, Ireland, Germany, Austria and Australia. You know - those mostly European countries that Romney and Ryan don't want us to be like.
Perhaps a better visual of what has happened to labor and wages, in spite of strong, steady increases in productivity, in contrast to that spike of 725% of executive compensation since 1978 is this:
Just to put this all in a visual perspective, here are some graphs from the Mother Jones article, Overworked Americans.
In the past 20 years, the US economy has grown nearly 60 percent. This huge increase in productivity is partly due to automation, the internet, and other improvements in efficiency. But it's also the result of Americans working harder—often without a big boost to their bottom lines. Oh, and meanwhile, corporate profits are up 20 percent.
You have nothing to lose but your gains
Productivity has surged, but income and wages have stagnated for most Americans. If the median household income had kept pace with the economy since 1970, it would now be nearly $92,000, not $50,000.
And for those of you who buy into the false notion that union workers are overpaid.......compared to management, and especially CEOs and other C-class (CFO, etc.), look at this:
Median yearly earnings of:
Union workers: $47,684Non-union workers: $37,284
This reflects the growing gap in wealth and income between the 1% and the 99%.
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