I think you're far too generous, Valerie. One million dollars should set the standard of individual wealth, period; it should be allowed to be maintained but not exceeded (plus a reasonable set of assets). Nor should surplus wealth be spent unnecessarily spent on infrastructure or raising the lifestyles of the indolent beyond modest levels. It could be used to maintain the planet that gives us life; to banish poverty (assistence qualified by commitments to population reduction, usefulness to society, and sustainability); to pay for R&D devoted to quality of active life rather than empty consumerism; and finally be put away for a rainy day. Such a ceiling to wealth would be within the reach of everyone, with no one being able to abuse their wealth and attendent power.
If enough countries signed up to such a protocol there would be few countries to flee to.
Such measures could transform Earth's disgusting human plague overnight, and despite those who chant COMMUNISM! there are no difficulties in it that couldn't be worked out--except that power might devolve to the people!

Of course you are right in principle, Valerie. Whether the cap be one million $ or higher or lower is moot. The important thing is the principle of much greater equality and wealth distribution.

But, while the majority of people in our society might agree with you about salary caps for CEOs, Directors and the like, how would it ever be brought about?

The cold hard truth is that governments at all levels are intimately linked with the big end of town, and will NEVER be what governments should be: INDEPENDENT and UNBIASED!

And that’s really the end that!

Shareholders might on occasion express outrage at the huge commission that their CEO is receiving, and that might translate into it being lowered a little.

The general community might even express enough outrage to result in some form of political action. But the most we could ever hope for is the implementation of some meaningless cap, like perhaps 100 million $ per annum, and not without enormous loopholes.

It’s HOPELESS!

The lack of independence of government, or more precisely; the terrible pandering of governments to the wishes of vested-interest big-business, not only assures massive fiscal inequality but ensures that our society, and most others around the world, will remain on a highly unsustainable path…. until it all comes crashing down.

[ some of my recent comments on this theme:
http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=4118
http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=11330#192320 ]

An interesting article and I couldn't help agreeing with much of what is said. However it strikes me as an article written with socialist attitudes that proclaim more of a level playing field. It makes me wonder where we should stop in this whirl-wind of greed (incentive) that is a capitalist society after all. Not perfect by any means, but better than an alternative of rules and regulation.

If you regulate salaries in private enterprise, do you regulate the even bigger salaries that sports people earn? The fact that they can endorse products of which they have often no connection with or knowledge, just because the public are obsessed with celebrities. What about actors who are able to demand enormous payments because they are well known and arguably could be replaced by lesser known but equally talented substitutes ?

In the case of company CEO's salaries, regulation should be done by the share holders (owners) of the organisation, but if they are happy (or stupid enough) then they are the ones to vote against them. Put the onus on them.

We don't live in a perfect world and nothing is fair and equal. If you want to reduce these absurd payments tackle the people who are ultimately responsible for paying these sums, the public. As they say, vote with your feet. Personally I have no desire to consider anything that doesn't appeal to me whether endorsed by Operah W. or Shane Warne. I just pay money when I think I shall get value. That applies to films, sport, banks, or concerts. Ultimately, I think most people do the same.

Nothing over 1 million dollars...why stop there?

If wealth disparity is the problem, the 3 billion people who earn less than $2 a day would look at everyday Australians like we are millionaires too. Do you exclude yourself from limits imposed onto your earnings?

If the world economy is valued at aprox. US$ 70 trillion/annum, with a population of 6.8 billion then a truly equitable divide would be earnings of about $10,000 per year. Would you agree to this or does social engineering only apply to those wealthier than yourself?

"We (who?) should set out a supposed budget for these rich people (you?). It could help bring their view of money closer to the real (3rd?) world."

*Our own country is full of people who could be content to be CEOs with incomes of less than a million dollars.*

Ah Valerie, if only life were so simple!

If your hard earned life's savings were on the line, who would you
entrust them to? Somebody content to do the job?

If you go back in Australian business history a little, you'll
find that by international standards, businesses here were very
badly managed. The tiny market, with huge tariff barriers, let
everyone go to sleep. Westpac nearly went broke in the 90s. BHP
was a stodgy, conservative, poorly managed affair. Coles was
a flop. In each case its taken an overseas CEO to come in, get
rid of the dead wood, bring in innovative business practises as
are practised in many overseas countries, reorganise the whole lot
really. If our companies arn't up to international standards,
they won't survive in the international marketplace.

A board needs the flexibility to employ the best potential candidate
for the job. People arn't going to move family and country, for
a gold watch.

Today most contracts are tied to performance. If the company performs
and achieves results, CEOs are paid large bonuses. The base salaries
of most CEOs are much lower, then what many eventually achieve.

So are you suggesting Valerie, that if a CEO turns a dud company
around and shareholders benefit handsomely, that this person
should not be paid for effort and skills?

That’s taking it right to the end of the spectrum, Stezza.

So I presume you are a strong proponent of international aid and of Australia considerably boosting its aid effort, and targeting it much better towards basic quality of life issues of the most needy.

THAT would be the way to try and address the global wealth disparity, NOT by fiscal equilibration: lowering our income in the western world and raising it in the third world to the same level… as if that could ever happen anyway.

Perhaps there should be an aid tax, which rises sharply with big incomes, so that the super-wealthy have to pay a highly disproportionately large amount to the desperately poor via our aid programs.

But then, of course that would never happen, because of the fundamental problem that I outlined in my last post – the very cosy relationship of governments and the big end of town.

All us middle-class Australians should be forking out a bit more towards international aid as well. This looks like it is going to happen as Rudd overhauls and increases our aid input….. while the super-rich continue to contribute a pittance and just become super-richer! \ :>(

Well said Stezza.

It's a lot harder to agree with socialism once you realise you are part of the evil 'wealthy' classes exploiting the poor.

Trying to regulate wealth in the way suggested is hugely problematic for one simple reason - what constitutes wealth is an entirely relative idea.

Of course we all feel exploited and under paid when we compare ourselves with the richest FEW. But shouldn't we be feeling even more strongly that we are overpaid and privileged by comparison with the poorest MANY?

Just think how commonly actors and sportsmen (who, like CEOs, are often paid extraordinary amounts of money for their work) and yet these same people are often heard complaining about others earning more.

When you boil it down, that's all socialism really is: people complaining about others earning more.

To those socialists who stubbornly can't get past the politics of envy, by all means go seize the assets of some wretched CEO/actor/sportsman, but don't kid yourself you're doing it for any other reason than envy, and don't cry foul, when you're the victim of someone poorer than you.

Valerie is hardly arguing for socialism when she argues that no-one should earn more than a million dollars. I'd personally put the figure at, say, $300,000 - let the CEOs who turn a company around bask in the sheer glory of having done so if such financial reward is not enough in itself. Of course there has to be incentive for hard work and enterprise, but what we don't want is a severely unequal society. Let the differential between the basic wage and the highest salary be no more than a factor of ten - from $30,000 (or whatever the basic wage is now) and $300,000.

Kalin1'
just because you rationalise that the absurd and obscene division of wealth is objected to only on the grounds of envy, doesn't make it so. I don't see why anyone needs or deserves redundant wealth, and I certainly don't envy such cretins, who measure life in such vulgar terms. The accumulation of wealth for its own sake comes at an enormous human and environmental cost and is ultimately unsustainable. Moreover there is nothing more divisive, socially, than this paradigm that puts such competitiveness before all else. And it does come first!
If the preservers of this vial status quo have nothing to offer against reform, bar that it's all relative so we might as well leave it the way it is, then their appetite for wealth is no match for their poverty of intellect!
The million dollars Mitchell suggests above should not be sneezed at. What does any individual want with more than that? And what inalienable right does he have to it (certainly it's rarely earned, and never without luck), especially while the other half starves! This is just bloody-minded (and bloody-realist) ideological clap-trap. What the hell is wrong with a little modesty in human affairs?
According to Jesus, "the more you have, the more it has you"!

Surely your proposal would simply lead to a further 'brain drain' in this country? If someone's business acumen is valued at well over a million dollars by shareholders of overseas companies, why would they bother sticking around and using that ability to steer Australian businesses?

If shareholders - ultimately, the owners of businesses and employers of their CEOs - are unhappy with the performance of their bosses, they have opportunities to voice that unhappiness at an AGM each and every year. They have opportunities to elect directors and to vote them out. The reality, though, is that the majority of shareholders are content to enjoy their dividends, use their shares for equity and allow those well-paid people who have got where they are because of what they could do to run their business for them.

The 'rob the rich' mentality seems a little sick to me, especially when we are robbing a meritocracy rather than an aristocracy.

When the French Guillotined all the "too big to fail' aristocrats, the threats of:

No Jobs & massive unemployment
No food production
Investor losses
anarchy
Commercial cessation

all failed to come true.

Why? Because its ordinary people who ran France. So it is too in Australia and a bunch of overpaid leeches at the top of banking, corporate and government posts
really are telling PORKIES when they say they are "too big to fail" and in need of multi million dollar pay rises.

In fact, if Australia is to find its true place in the world then anyone who claims to be too big to fail must have their salary and remunerations CUT to no more than the salary of the Prime Minister.

Until that comes to pass we are all going to be pushed into failure while CEO's immigrate us into extinction and become 'Gods' - in their own minds.

Some forty years ago large Australian manufacturing companies had a points system (Hayes?) which meant that an income range was set for each supervisory and management position. Each salary range included a base amount and a dollar range for each point.

It was accepted that each step in level should be about 40% above the level below and that about five or six levels were all that was necessary ot manage a large organisation. The Roman Catholic Church was quoted as an example of being successful with only four full steps in the ladder. Six levels with 40% increase per level gives a highest to lowest ratio of less than eight so top salaries would in today's terms be about $400,000.

Peter Drucker, a management guru of that time, in one book mentioned a study that showed that a business with wide salary ranges was doomed to fail in the long term. I assume that is because co-operation in management is more productive that jealousy.

Can anyone imagine the steel industry in the sixties being relatively strike free and successful if strong unions realised that the CEO was being paid 150 times a furnaceman's wages.

*This is just bloody-minded ideological clap-trap.*

You are speaking for yourself here, Squeers.

*What does any individual want with more than that?*

You clearly don't have an entrepreneurial bone in your body!

Have you never had a great idea, to fix, change something that
pissed you off? Without such people, who combine great ideas
with capital, there would be no internet, there would have been
no industrial revolution, there would in fact be very little.

The Wright brothers developed planes. Edison spent a fortune
on tickering with everything. We all still benefit.

Try going farming without land or machines.

*Moreover there is nothing more divisive, socially, than this paradigm that puts such competitiveness before all else*

Sheesh, so a college kid comes up with Facebook, hundreds of millions
join and you claim its divisive! Apple creates the I-pad, tens
of millions buy it, you claim its divisive. Without capital,
Apple would still be in the garage. The world is littered with
dreamers, who dare to put their money where their mouth is and
change the world. What is divisive about that? Why should I
object?

Yabby:
<You clearly don't have an entrepreneurial bone in your body!>

Well thank you, Yabby, that's the nicest thing you've ever said to me.
But do you know what, the Wright brothers, Edison et al didn't do it for the money.
And guess what, I'm in awe at human ingenuity! In fact I think it's limitless, or limited only by circumstance.
So do you think we're really hitting our straps now with the Ipad etc?
What couldn't we accomplish, I wonder, depending on the motivation?
But unfortunately all that creative power is geared to making a buck, limited to that rather than to actual human need, I mean need as opposed to amusement, to killing time because it's unbearable.
Just stop and think for a moment. We are just another life form indigenous to this planet, but out of all the beasties we alone have transcended nature! We use the materials at hand in the most incredible and complex ways. But what do we do with that incredible gift? We limit it, tailor it to its earning potential. What's worse is these entrepreneurs don't only exploit their own abilities, they rob the rest of their potential by seducing them with a winning but fatal formula. The vast majority run to seed in an access of excess, never knowing what it is to live creatively and fulfilled.
This sounds romantic but it is at least another way of seeing things.

Yabby
The article was not about entrepreneurs or inventors. It was about functionaries - people who are only good at getting other people to do their work reasonably well.

Very high income for functionaries will tend to destroy the societies where their salaries are too high when compared to the incomes of those who produce real wealth.

When has the chief executive of a bank, or a speculator in derivatives, ever invented anything that brought substantial benefits to human society?

All the so called money sloshing around the financial markets is in reality worthless compared to the natural resources that have been consumed to produce those money amounts.

*But do you know what, the Wright brothers, Edison et al didn't do it for the money.*

No Squeers, but they needed money to do it! Do you really think that
a Steve Jobs, does it for the money? These people do it for passion,
money is simply the outcome. But they need money to be creative,
to take calculated risks, etc. The bloke who builds the Tesla,
he became creative and invented Paypal. Bill Gates uses his wealth,
to help the poor around the world, in ways in which Govts have
failed. Smart, creative people, generally do it better then rooms
full of beaurocrats.

*So do you think we're really hitting our straps now with the Ipad etc?*

So how many trees will be saved, if in 10 years time, we stop printing
newspapers and download our papers onto our i-pads or similar?
You think that won't be progress or good for the environment?

*But unfortunately all that creative power is geared to making a buck*

You still don't understand what drives the mega rich, Squeers.
Most are highly passionate about what they do and commonly reinvest
it in what they are passionate about. You now have large chunks of
South American forest being preserved, because some rich guys are
buying up the land, so that humans can't stuff it completely.
That is just one example.

I've told you before, population remains the elephant in the room
and if humanity wants to survive, perhaps we should start there.
But we gloss over it and instead bash those who make more then us.
Pure envy.

I ask you all the same question. Who really needs to earn $40k per annum?

"What does any individual want with more than that?"

The thing which motivates you to work so you can afford cars, tvs, etc is the same thing which motivates the rich.

CEO's are warning Government of the dangers of all things sparkly, shiny and shimmery hanging around Sydney at Christmas.

Curious poor people are a risk for choking, blocking, gridlocking, cutting, shocking and even killing, says the RSPCCEO
which, on behalf of its CEO members is responsible for manipulating society into believing that obscene Pay-Increases are a democratic benefit.

The organisation's Chief is urging the NSW Government to take precautions to ensure the poor do not chew lights, break baubles or handle anything blade or string-like.

And trees!

If the poor consume trees we could find ourselves ill, with vomiting from our air-pollution, diarrhoea from our solid-wastes causing irritation and loss to our billion dollar lifestyles.

"To avoid any accidents, the best place to put these poor people is in the western suburbs and make Cronulla to Palm Beach off limits to indigents," the Board of Directors said.

"We've seen cases where poor have located and stolen whole boxes of our cash that were wrapped and sitting inside an ATM," they said .

And as dog owners will tell you, chocolate itself can be a canine killer and should be kept out of reach - along with a whole gamut of goodies often enjoyed by bin-snooping mutts.

"Don't share Christmas lunch or other human civilities with the poor," The Board warned.

And for those who love parties, it is important to ensure our indigent friends have a quiet bolt hole to go if the city is abuzz with festive activity.

"Their routine can easily be disrupted and they may become agitated or stressed and demand expensive services" the Board said.

"Make sure the poor have access to a quiet suburb where they can relax and and spend up to stimulae OUR economy. This may help to keep them calm and stave off any misbehaviour that might ensue."

At the end of the season we expect to take all these savings and roll them into our next super Pay Rises. If those in Government want their share of that remuneration trickled down to them then they must mark these directives.

*When has the chief executive of a bank, or a speculator in derivatives, ever invented anything that brought substantial benefits to human society?*

Foyle, see it this way. If the CEO of a bank gets it wrong, billions
are at stake, not mere hundreds of millions.

A bank like say Westpac, has 600 billion on its books. That is
six hundred thousand million $!

That is a huge responsibility. If they judge a few corporate loans
wrong, woosh, its gone. It has happened before in Australia.

For that kind of responsibility, you really want to hire the best
brains around. If you have shares in the bank or money in the bank,
you want to know its in the best, most sensible hands.

So wether you pay that person 1 million or 10 million, it has no
effect on the bottom line. The decisions which that person makes,
has billions of $ of effect on the bottom line.

Take a look at the ANZ, which appointed Mike Smith as the new CEO.
Smith was lured from Asia, where he'd had a great deal of experience.
Smith has already had a big effect on the ANZ share price, with his
new directions and policies. He would not have come to Australia,
for a gold watch.

The real problem is, finding exceptional CEOs. They are rare. So
when you do find one, hang onto him/her.

Yabby,
CEO's do not make the big decisions on their own, at least not those who wish to make sensible decisions.
In banking most of the big decisions are laid off, much as in bookmaking, to spread the risk. How many banks had their fingers singed in the ABC Learning debacle? It wasn't just one.
In my time in heavy industry I was aware of many decisions made because a CEO had a brainwave and many of those didn't pay off.
Too many CEOs are "emperors with no clothes" and are worth no more than about 40% above those on the next rung down.
When greed was not to the fore that satisfied many competent people.

Yabby forgets too that good CEO's (supposing such creatures exist) only command such a price because the system is competitive (and frankly insane). In the real world they're not half as useful as a bricklayer or a baker.

*In my time in heavy industry I was aware of many decisions made because a CEO had a brainwave and many of those didn't pay off.*

Foyle, nobody is claiming that the title of CEO guarantees some
kind of intelligence. Yup, some are dummies. On the other hand,
when you see what a Jack Walsh did for GE or a Michael Chaney did
for Wesfarmers, I think that those sorts of people should be
fully compensated, for they are taking on the role of entrepreneur
really, with all the stresses and strains that this entails.

* In the real world they're not half as useful as a bricklayer or a baker.*

Squeers, unless of course, they lost your lifes savings, invested in
the company, then you would be squealing and change your mind.

Once upon a time a man walked through a swamp of human misery caused by Government greed, immigration programs and subsequent overpopulation.

A leech jumped off a tea tree and started to gorge on his blood, first injecting a blood thinner and a local anaesthetic and then slicing his skin with 3 very hi-tech intersecting cuts. The man was so amazed at the intelligence and innovation of this creature he thought it must be a leader for him to follow. Presently another leech and another jumped on his body and began to gorge. The leeches let him know through their psychic media that they were competitive and not colluding so he was getting good technological value for his blood.

All was well and the man said to himself this must be the best of all possible world to live in. I think I will call it capitalism. But then the leeches dropped off one day and went away to multiply. When the young ones came back to bite him he began to feel weak and ill. He started using the hospital system and complaining to the government.

The Government had meetings and said we can't afford the health costs so we will immigrate more people into the swamp for the leeches to feed upon and we will build crematoriums near that mans house so the midnight smoky wafts of dead bodies and charred coffins will kill him off quickly with respiratory disease and heart attacks. If that doesn't work we will build PVC extrusion factories and the dioxin emissions will kill him even faster.

The leeches lobbyists told the government that was a wonderful idea and asked if their psychic media outlets could float the idea of building 770,000 more houses in the swamp to attract 2 million more immigrants for them to feed on. The Government said that was a wonderful idea and it would make them more powerful so they would not have to listen to any one person's complaint anymore and they could do what ever they wanted.

Continuing,

Continued,

They could even build tunnels that cost $1.4 million a meter and make windfall profits out of twice removed secret investment portfolios. Too many people would drown the voices of the few smart enough to complain. The Government knew it was on a good thing!

So life in the swamp got worse for everyone except for the leeches who raised their blood sucking quotas by 50% every year from that time forth and for the Government who were so rich they could afford nuclear weapons so they could never again lose another election.

And the leeches all raised their voices in unison: "We leeches are innovators who must be admired for our cunning. We are never paid with too much blood, even if we oversee the odd banking disasters:you depend on us for you personal salivation & it is NOT time, and there will NEVER be a time for us to be reined in."

An excellent parable, KAEP.
The problem is that the people are so used to the blood-sucking leeches, they think that's the way it's "meant" to be and couldn't be any other way. No one bats an eyelid at the appalling disparities at large in the world, which have "no" justification.
Humans are remarkable at accommodating themselves to prevailing conditions, and once living memory is disposed of the new reality, born into, is hypostasised. Ideologies and traditions are even woven around the prevailing conditions--such as that "life wasn't 'meant' to be easy"--to provide rationalisation and "some" comfort during the "leaching" (of life force) process. Though the more important function of these institutions is to preserve ideal conditions for leeches. It's not even only those they suck on who suffer now, the whole environment is becoming unstable thanks to their unslakable appetites.
I used to work in a factory that employed both sexes. It was sexist and the women had the lowliest jobs; one in particular was so trying that many new workers quit before a week was out. The job was used to sort chaff from corn for years; once the worker stood it for a couple of months, she'd be moved to something easier. It never ceased to amaze me how many of these women would "ask" to remain where they were rather than be moved! Better the evil you know, seemed the logic.
And this human virtue (forbearance) is the greatest obstacle to reform. In all my years in factories, I constantly witnessed the best being made of a bad lot (and often the worst of a good lot). Human beings adapt. That's what they appear programmed to do by default. Yet they are also creative and innovative and capable of great things given the chance. But that capacity is precisely the life-force that is sucked-out by capitalism and converted into profit--not into a better, "more human", life (consumption for its own sake doesn't count). In return the worker gets what is mockingly called "a living": subsistence and a scripted life--if you're one of the lucky ones!

*No one bats an eyelid at the appalling disparities at large in the world, which have "no" justification.*

Squeers, your idealism is touching, but hardly realistic. Nature is
not fair, life is not fair, genetic distribution is not fair, get
used to it. All the idealism in the world won't fix that.

*Yet they are also creative and innovative and capable of great things given the chance.*

Absolutaly. So main thing is that we have a system where those who
want that chance, are given that chance. That we have. Others are
simply not interested. They are quite content with the way things
are. You make the fatal flaw of seeing the world only through your
perception, not others perception.

In my last business, I employed a bunch of women who had to do what
can only be called boring and repetitive work, for just average pay.
Yet they loved coming to work. Why? Because they were all friends,
all women, and could talk about all those things that a bunch of women
want to talk about. Mixing a male in there, would have ruined it for
them. I used to let them decide who we hired, if somebody left.
That way they all got on great. When I once ignored that rule, it
was disaster.

The point is some people are quite content with their life. They
focus on their family, their kids, their friends, their footy team,
etc. To suggest that they should be miserable, because somebody earns
more somewhere, is clearly wrong.

You clearly have a problem with it, others don't. Not everyone sees
the world from your perspective.

Yabby you completely miss the point.
Creativity is drawn-off as profit. Human ingenuity is converted, literally, into commodified use and exchange values. That is, what humans would naturally be doing from exigency, or optimally from their own creative/aesthetic sense, is converted into a dollar-value plus profit. Thus creativity is exploited and compromised from the start, never attaining its potential.
Where you make your mistake, Yabby, is you judge everything by the prevailing context, as if it formed an immutable backdrop.
You say: <Yet they loved coming to work. Why? Because they were all friends, all women, and could talk about all those things that a bunch of women want to talk about>
Isn't this precisely what I was admiring (and bemoaning) about humanity above; that capacity to accommodate itself to the prevailing conditions? You surely don't see that capacity as an endorsement of the system you celebrate? Inmates in maximum-security prisons will find means to enjoy life, just as animals in zoos will in most cases breed; is that then an endorsement of incarceration? Is not the fact that 20% of us, in any one year, suffers a mental "illness" rather damning?
The problem is that we accommodate ourselves just as readily to unconscionable conditions, wherein we mutely gloat at the other half.
Read Blake's Songs of Innocence, and Of Experience, and how the moneyed classes blithely hired chimney-sweeps to get stuck and die in their filthy flues, or exploited child labour in a host of other unspeakable ways, or turned their backs as we do on human wretchedness and misery.

*Human ingenuity is converted, literally, into commodified use and exchange values.*

Err so what? It means that we can use those exchange values, to
finance continuing human ingenuity. Having dreams is not enough
Squeers, it takes other resources to make them happen. Our system
allows for that. Literally anyone can do it.

*Isn't this precisely what I was admiring (and bemoaning) about humanity above*

Squeers, if they are happy, then why should anyone bemoan it?
Your incarcerated example is quite different. Those people are stuck
where they are, without choice. You Squeers, are free to put on
your old hippy gear, head for Nimbin, set up your Tipi and contemplate
life. Our system will feed you, clothe you and pay for your medical
bills. You are hardly unfree.

* Is not the fact that 20% of us, in any one year, suffers a mental "illness" rather damning?*

Nope. It says that some of us suffer from mental illness. Others
of us make bad choices in life, from choosing the wrong occupation
to marrying the wrong partner. When the stress gets too much, we
need help.

Wesfarmers have sold out and gone broke though havent they Yabby? Or perhaps they are on the way out? I was told this only a couple of months ago. Or was it Elders?

*Wesfarmers have sold out and gone broke though havent they Yabby?*

Not so, Unique. Clearly finance is not your strong point :)

Wesfarmers today are Australia's 8th largest company, capitalised
at 36 billion $, with hundreds of thousands of employees and
hundreds of thousands of shareholders. Most super funds would
have a stake in them too.

Much of their growth, from a simple farmers coop, to a mega company,
was due to the efforts of Michael Chaney, CEO for a long time.There
is many a farmer in WA, who has been rescued financially, by those
Wesfarmers shares, left in the bottom drawer for years.

Michael was well paid, but he deserved every cent.

You are perhaps thinking of Elders. Yes, they have a few problems.

Yabby,

What about all of those internationally successful European and Japanese companies? How can they exist? These countries have much less inequality than the Anglosphere countries, and CEOs are not as well paid. Why aren't the really talented ones simply lured away by more money elsewhere? You give anecdotal evidence of companies that were turned around by highly paid CEOs, but why isn't it possible to establish a general link between CEO pay and company performance, at least for large firms?

http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/news/research/compensation_daines_ceopay.shtml

In the US during the 1950s, there was rapid economic growth, which was shared more or less proportionately between the social classes. Now, the share of income going to the people at the top has increased dramatically, while the bottom 90% of the population have had stagnant real incomes since the 1970s. Even many people in the top 10% have only gotten a few crumbs. See

http://www.epi.org/analysis_and_opinion/entry/jobs_with_good_benefits_increasingly_scarce/

How, exactly, have ordinary Americans benefitted from those enormous CEO salaries and bonuses?

Stezza likes to talk about the politics of envy, but personally, I couldn't care less if Stezza has more consumer trinkets than I do. I have everything that I need or could reasonably want. However, I care a great deal if Stezza is rich enough to buy my government and to cocoon himself from the downside of the policies he is advocating. In "Collapse", Jared Diamond remarked one of the things that distinguish whether a society will collapse or solve its problems and survive is whether the elite can insulate themselves from the problems that their policies are causing for ordinary people. When a society does collapse, of course, the children of the elite suffer as much as anyone else, and maybe more, because the other people blame them.

In my view, Valerie has it about right, as there does have to be some incentive for performance.

Divergence, you are quite correct, in Japan, Korea etc, CEO salaries
are much lower then in the anglo West. The way I understand it,
its a totally different culture. Workers are generally company men,
they join after college and stay for life, alot of the time.
Japanese culture is very much about not rocking the boat and conforming
with the majority. Its one of their strengths, but also one of
their weaknesses, as it restricts innovation and change.

I am unaware of too many top Japanese having been headhunted by
Western companies, for I think that the cultural divide is simply
too great.

I actually agree, I think that some US CEO salaries are way over the
top. But given that they are private companies, I think its up to
shareholders to express their outrage, if the board gets it wrong.
Shareholders are ultimately risking their capital and paying that
wage, so in that sense, its a private matter, not a public matter.

Govt has its chance to rake in its share, through taxation, in order
to level the playing field to some degree.

I think that our press has a bit to answer for too, when it comes to
CEO salaries. The press love sensational headlines, so that is what
they produce. Yet AFR recently published a guide to CEO salaries
and the majority of those from really large companies were on
1-3 million $. Then they were given performance bonuses, if the
company should meet certain parameters, in the next 5 years or
whatever. So many of those CEOs will only be paid the claimed amount,
if all goes according to plan for years ahead. The press commonly
try to present it, as if its in the weekly paypacket.

Given the base salary of 1-3 million, take away half for tax and
the figures are not that far off what Valerie is on about.

My point is this: A board of a private company, with private investors
money at stake, should not be restricted as to whom they can hire,
based on social policy that some would like-to-introduce

Clearly finance is not your strong point :)

LOL - you would not be stating this if you knew me Yabby; more importantly, however, I would prefer to be labelled as weaker in finance, than weaker in spirit - a 'giver' throughout life (in a constructive way)receives a great deal more than a person who focusses on their financial situation constantly.

Farmers and Graziers do not require 'shares' to be assisted by Wesfarmers though Yabby. Just a little correction from experience.

If you didn't know, there was a depression in Australia in the 1930's, a depression or recession in the US also, and probably in the UK and the rest of the world. We were pulled out of it by Harold Holt, he experimented with the tax and found that a top tax of 66.6% was needed to restrain obscene incomes. This tax kept Australia with a good economy for 20 years, 1950 to 1970. What Harold did not realise was that a higher no tax amount, and if this 66.6% was applied to a $450,000 taxable income, and about $30,000 was the no tax amount, our economy would tops. No treasurer, Labor or Liberal, has the necessary intelligence or integrity to correct that anomality. Wayne Swan has had it put to him, but their salary and perks are too high, and even if they get kicked out , they still get far more than they are worth. Only Honest, intelligent people are worth $1million, and they would be satisfied with the same as any workman. The greed of the politicians shows their true value. Have a look on the internet at "Tax history of the US", "Tax history of Australia", "Tax history of the UK",and "Taxes around the world", and remember that the US is in a depression now, and so is most of the world, Australia has been if recession 3 times, and skimming along just clear of it, and both the Labor and the LIberal/National parties are to blame.

Merv09,

Right on! But let me digress a moment.

NSW Government has declared a "Prorogued" Parliament. In Latin that means to supend in order to ask more questions (ie do research). A genuine and common enough strategy. However in Keneally's case the Romans would gleefully declare a "Profraused" Parliament. That is, suspended in order to deceive the many from the intentions of the few who consider themselves too big to fail even as they head for failure at the March 2011 election.

Hopefully, the dire cost consequencs to NSW citizens of privatised electricity will lead to a full-on revolt that will clean out Macquarie Street. I don't know a single person in NSW who will be able to afford electricity in 3 years time. And electricity next to petrol is the only thing that keeps our society from THERMAL EQUILIBRIUM or total decay and collapse. Human societies must understand that all things in this Universe obey the Second Law of Thermodynamics and that necessarily applies to NSW and its many varied communities.

Your Holtism of taxing the rich at 66% is the only answer to stop the arrogance of the few in pursuit of collapsing the many.

Additionally I propose that new immigrants must pay ~$300,000 infrastructure dollars to settle in NSW areas where electricity is already at a premium. This will shift the burden of infrastructure costs onto those who make new infrastructure necessary. That is basic JUSTICE and DECENCY. Not the "bleeding-heart" welcome freeloading Adolf Hitler immigrants in case they might be a new Olympic medal contender, Labor Party doyen or a criminally inclined Barangaroo proponent.

Continues,

Also people don't realise that in order to get on a rickety media attracting boat to come here, illegal immigrants have to pay smugglers up to US$30,000.

In order to make that kind of cash in poor countries like Sri Lanka they would necessarily have kicked the bejesus out of maybe a thousand or more of their fellow citizens. They can afford the $300,000 to pay for electricity infrastructure.

Let's see. 1 million new Sydney Labor Party immigrants proposed by Keneally's headkickers @ $300,000 apiece? That's $300 billion dollars for new gas fired power stations. And OUR electricity bills will be greener & at least stay the same or go back to 1990's prices before a flood of Labor immigrants made it necessary to up the price.

I'm Proimmigration but I will not tolerate seeing NSW citizens being made to $bleed$ all over the place in order to accommodate spiteful & ungrateful immigrants who serve nothing but secular political objectives.