Executive Compensation: are stockholders being ripped-off?

Executive Compensation: Are Stockholders Being Ripped-off?

The compensation paid to the CEOs of some of the largest banks and auto manufacturers, all of whom have been having big problems with profitability recently, were reportedly:

Vikram Pandit of Citigroup: $ 38,237,437 in 2008*
Kenneth Lewis of Bank of America: 9,857,723 in 2008*
Jeffrey Immelt of General Electric: 9,280,935 in 2008*
Richard Wagoner of General Motors: 19,761,874 in 2007*
Alan Mulally of Ford Motor Co.: 22,750,385 in 2007*

(*I am using these figures because they were the ones available at www.aflcio.org/corporatewatch/paywatch website. Some of the pay was down from the previous year, and some was up.)

Executive compensation at all corporations is determined by the corporation’s board of directors, the members of which are largely executives of other corporations. The explanation usually given by the directors
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