Are CEO's paid what they are worth?

Question

I mean yes I've read that they usually get paid mostly with stocks, so better performance = better pay, and if they were recruited from an outside company they tend to have little influence over its board to get higher compensation. But even though they will get fired if they do a bad job, they still get a huge severance. What do you guys think? Or do you have any examples of CEO's that are good or bad?

Answer 1

Assuming the employment agreement was voluntary, they get paid what they're worth by definition. The fact that YOU might make a different decision is irrelevant.

Answer 2

Most CEOs I have ever met weren't worth what they were being paid.  I worked for a company for 16 years.  The CEO was one floor up, and I saw this guy in person one time.  What is he doing?  Taking extended vacations?

Answer 3

Some are over paid.

Answer 4

I  believe many are over paid.   When they are getting  between  10  and  20  million dollars    a  year it's  not like  they have to  live  paycheck to paycheck.  And some companies  that say they  bought back billions of dollars of stock,  to save dividend payments.  ok

But  it  seems  odd  that  when these buy backs  were  being made,  the  stock  price nearly doubles,  this way  the big board  stock owners get paid huge  checks amongst them.

After spreading the wealth amongst the top.

The stock price goes back down to half  and  the  employees   lose  $20,000  to  $40,000  in  their investments.But are told  just  relax  your still  employed  for now.

Yes they  should have  a  fair salary to  run  a  big corporation

but  10 million a year seems  a bit extreme,  if  they work  8  to  10 hours  a day like the rest of  us  and  spend  a  regular amount on biils  and  extras,  seems  they could  still  live  well  on  even  a  million or  two.   Each year they cannot spend  all  that money it becomes  surplus  in their accounts.

Money that could be invested in  more competitive infrastructure,  more newer advanced  equipment to provide services  customers  demand.   Some larger companies  are taken over by smaller operations  because  the competition  provides  a service  the  customers want,  they invest  more into  the required infrastructure,  and take  over.  

And  the  corporation  loses  the customer  base  and  funding it  had and  cannot  overtake  it's  losses  and sells out.  

They demand   the  employees  give  them  150%  to  beat  the competition,  on   about  70%  of   the  manpower,  and  structure.   The  difference  is  kept  for  the  top  management.

Yes many  of  the employees  get paid  well,  and  above  average  in  many areas.   I  would  not  complain  nor  do  I  want  to  be paid  millions,   just  that it  seems  that  much of  this money  could  be  better  invested   in more  employees,  more  updated  equipment,  lower prices,  and circulated  through  the  economy.

Answer 5

one thing to keep in mind is that the highly paid CEOs are usually old farts who spent decades reaching that position.

They were not millionaires when they were in their 20s, 30s, 40s, or even 50s much of the time.

They usually work up the ladder very slowly, and are not at the top until they are old , wrinkled, decrepid farts who are too old to enjoy all that money.

The exceptions of course are CEOs who actually founded the company, such as Bill Gates, or michael Dell, or the leaders of Yahoo and Google.  But most CEOs are leaders of old companies that have been around for 50 or 100 or 150 years.

They started off as a low level manager and sucked-asss their way to the top.

Answer 6

CEO's like steve jobs and richard branson are actively involved and their presence carries a certain goodwill value for the company. Paying them the hefty bonuses and salaries are justified, however there are a lot of CEO's that are in that position only because they are either married to the chairman's daughter or they are vetrans in company politics, people who don't deserve or don't actively participate in their company's wellbeing are overpaid.

Answer 7

At one time yes. This is a situation that has gotten out of control. Companies are cutting wages on guys barely making enough to support a family "to keep the business afloat" and at the same time, the CEOs of these companies are making 200-300% wage increases each year. I understand 1-2 million/year is hard to live on but when you're taking 2 million away from the bottom rung and then handing it over to a handful of people so they can make an extra couple million, it makes me sick.