re: CEOs make too much money

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The problem is there are a lot of mediocre CEO’s making ridiculous money.

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Are you just upset about the CEOs of public companies? What about small businesses or larger private businesses?

Should the CEO of a small business, who built the business, not reap the fruit of his labor? I make a lot more than my employees, but I have all of the risk and worked pretty hard to build it. Now I have a lot of free time and am building other things, but I still manage it overall, and it wouldn't exist without me.

Cargill, Inc. is the largest privately held business in the USA so we have no idea what their CEO makes but we do know they generate over $160 billion in revenue every year. Should he not be compensated for helping maintain and grow the business without taking it public?

What’s more, the cash compensation is a small portion of overall compensation. The CEO of Walmart (US) in 2025 got $1.3M in salary. $2.8M in bonus. And the rest is almost all stock.

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Stop fighting to bring down their pay and instead fight to uplift the pay of the workers

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You're arguing with people who think there are a finite number of dollars and the "fat cats" are hoarding them away from the "little man." Union brain washing is prevalent even among non-union people.

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They’re the reason for the large tv contracts that allow them to be paid that much. That’s not the case for the CEO of a company.

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Huh? Of course it is If a company like GM fails, is it because of CEO leadership, or is it the workers’ fault?

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Maybe a better comparison for a CEO would be the GM of a pro sports team, but they aren’t being paid 30000x more than the players.

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Wait until you find out what arena workers and juicier room janitors make.

We found the freeloader

its fricking simple supply and demand. Do you think the company wants to pay the CEO that much?

do you think the NFL wants to pay players as much as they do? no, but its simple supply and demand.

What has changed in “supply and demand” to justify why CEO’s make 300:1 the average employee, when it was 30:1 in the 80’s? At what point is it unacceptable regardless of the “free market” says? 3000:1? 30000:1?

The market ain’t free anymore. Government involvement, activist hedge funds, and buddy buddy BoDs have made a nice little honey pot for themselves. Everyone’s getting rich except the middle class that executes the plan that the consulting firm hired by the CEO comes up with.

But if you don’t agree, you’re a neck beard, communist who’s jealous and doesn’t understand the market.

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He became CEO in 2013 when Sears was already in big trouble. Their last profitable year was 2010, and their sales were steadily declining. He tried to right the ship for 5 years before stepping down, and his hedge fund put in a bid to acquire some of the assets.

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Oh they definitely were in trouble. And he definitely sold and bought most everything of value from sears leaving them a shell with no way to make money as they collapsed. He made himself far wealthier on the decline of the company....

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What has changed in “supply and demand” to justify why CEO’s make 300:1 the average employee, when it was 30:1 in the 80’s? At what point is it unacceptable regardless of the “free market” says? 3000:1? 30000:1?

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The CEO to employee ranking use to be 30:1 in the 1980s which I can understand but it is now approaching 300:1 in some companies. Seems like things are out of whack.

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Once again ...


Superficially, it might seem more that way than is actually the case.

Corporations freely determine compensation in a competitive capitalistic economy. So one would assume there must be more to it. After all, companies overpaying for material and/or personnel don't tend to stick around.

Let's take a better look.

First off, for current companies with a market cap < $1-2 Billion, the CEO:Employee income ratio is 32:1. Going back to the 1970's (not the 1980s) when the CEO:Employee income ratio was 30:1, the S&P market cap was about $700 Billion (or ~$1.4 Billion per company). In those terms, CEO:Employee income ratios are fairly consistent.

But whereas the 1970's S&P was valued at $0.7T and traded in a range of 65-115 (we'll call it ~ 90 for purposes of discussion), it's current MC is ~$55T (or ~$110 Billion per company) and it trades at 6300 (about 69x its 1970s number). CEO:Employee income ratio for S&P companies runs at 285:1

S&P market cap is up 79-fold since the 70s. The S&P trades at 70x its 1970's counterpart. Meanwhile, the S&P CEO:Employee income ratio is up 9.5-fold.

Now, one can certainly argue inflationary impact in those differentials. However, the fact is, when a company grows from 1000 to 10000 or 100000 employees, those employees are doing the same basic job they were doing all along, but for the CEO, there are significantly expanded requirements.

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The CEO to employee ranking use to be 30:1 in the 1980s which I can understand but it is now approaching 300:1 in some companies. Seems like things are out of whack.

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True, but it's not the government's responsibility to fix this. I think professional athletes are grossly overpaid, but don't believe the government should get involved to limit their salaries.