Unlike the rest of the population, the CEOs of major companies couldn’t be happier with how the economy is going. Good times are back!
According to figures obtained by Equilar for the New York Times:
The median pay for top executives at 200 major companies was $9.6 million last year. That was a 12 percent increase over 2009.
On this year’s list, the highest-paid C.E.O. was Philippe P. Dauman of Viacom, who made $84.5 million in just nine months. (Viacom changed its fiscal year-end to September from December.)
Also at the top was Ray R. Irani, the C.E.O. of Occidental Petroleum, who took home $76.1 million last year, up 142 percent from the previous one. Last year, the board awarded Mr. Irani a $33 million cash bonus plus $40.3 million in stock awards, more than double what he received in 2009.
The “worst paid” CEOs are Citigroup’s Vikram S. Pandit and Apple’s Steven P. Jobs. They’re being granted symbolic base salaries of $1 per year.
Now think about this. If you go to college, get good grades and through a miracle you land a nice white collar job paying $100,000/year, you’d have to work 84 years to match what Viacom’s CEO made in 9 months.
