Numbers junkies, this report?s for you: The Institute for Policy Studies has published its 16th annual executive compensation survey, this one entitled, "America?s Bailout Barons: Taxpayers, High Finance and the CEO Pay Bubble."
As you can guess, it is not a celebration of executive remuneration.
The central theme is that pay for American corporate leaders remains grossly inflated, despite government and investor efforts to rein it in.
Not surprisingly after what the nation has been through over the last year, the report focuses on compensation packages for top executives of the biggest financial companies. All the usual suspects are here -- Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Citigroup, etc.
The watchdog role of groups like the institute is important, of course. But the 36-page report is numbers-heavy to a fault. Did you know, for example, that 100 workers making the 2008 average annual wage would have to labor over 1,000 years to make as much as the top 100 executives at the top 20 bailed-out financial firms made in three years?
No, you didn't know.
The institute?s report is meant to infuriate, and it will accomplish that. But it may quickly cause eye-glazing in all but the most avid data hounds.
Still, if you?re ever looking for a pay-related figure -- say, the ratio of average CEO compensation to average worker pay -- it?s all here. (That number was 319 last year, according to the study.)
Also useful is a section of the report tracking the various recent federal proposals to reform (i.e., curb) compensation.
-- Tom Petruno
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