A report from the Institute for Policy Studies looked at CEO compensation from the 50 companies that layed off more workers during the recession. They found the CEOs at these companies are paid more, on average, than the average pay for the CEOs running to top 500 companies in the U.S. (S&P 500).
Sarah Anderson is the lead author of the report. She says,
"CEOs are squeezing workers to boost short-term profits and fatten their own paychecks."
While workers wages have remained stagnant, the report finds that CEO compensation has been skyrocketing,
after adjusting for inflation, CEO pay in 2009 more than doubled the CEO pay average for the decade of the 1990s, more than quadrupled the CEO pay average for the 1980s, and ran approximately eight times the CEO average for all the decades of the mid-20th century.
30 times more grows to 263 times more
More numbers to think about... the authors say just a few CEOs in the 1970s made more than 30 times what their workers made. Today, "CEOs of major U.S. corporations averaged 263 times the average compensation of American workers."
CNN calls the group "left-leaning" - but so far, I haven't seen any reporters questioning their numbers. Let us know if you know of numbers that differ from what IPS purports.
