Why do American CEOs get paid so much? | James K Galbraith

'Let the market decide' has been the mantra for decades. This dysfunction and inequality is the inevitable result

A new report from the Economic Policy Institute calls attention to the hardy perennial of how much America's corporate titans make: bosses of the top 350 firms made an average of $18.9m in 2017. That's a ratio of 312-1 over the median worker in their industries. Big bucks to be sure. And a big change since 1965, when the ratio was just 20-1. But what does it mean? And if there's a problem, what is it, exactly?

What it means, as the EPI economists carefully document, is that the top US corporate chiefs are paid overwhelmingly with stock options, and their income fluctuates with the market. About 80% of the pay packet is in stocks, and the rise of 17% in 2017 after two flat years surely suggests that the top CEOs (not unreasonably) sensed the market peaked last year. So they cashed in. On the other 20% of the pay packets, no gains occurred.

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