CEOs Who Look Overpaid to Americans Seem Just Right to Boards
- Stanford research shows 71% of directors say CEO pay is fair
- About 74% of public view top executives as `vastly overpaid'
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More than 70 percent of directors of the biggest U.S. companies say top executives’ pay is in line with performance. That’s a blunt contrast to the view of almost three-quarters of Americans, who consider corporate bosses overpaid, Stanford University research shows.
The disconnect, highlighted in two Stanford studies, comes as both Republican and Democratic presidential candidates criticize compensation as too high. Along with the big majority of directors happy with chief executive officer pay, 84 percent of CEOs said they feel their pay is in line, according to one of the reports, which was done with executive recruiter Heidrick & Struggles.