FTSE 100 chief executives 'earn average salary within 3 days'

[andysays]

Here's a stark reminder of the level of inequality in Britain today.

Bosses of Britain's biggest companies will earn more in the first three days of this week than the average workers' annual wage, research claims. By 17:30 GMT on Wednesday, the pay of FTSE 100 chiefs will have overtaken the £31,461 annual median wage for full time workers, the High Pay Centre says.

High Pay Centre director Luke Hildyard said chief executive pay is about 120 times that of the typical UK worker, up significantly from two decades ago. "Estimates suggest it was around 50 times at the turn of the millennium or 20 times in the early 1980s," he said.

But high-earning bosses don't have it all their own way

Bosses' pay was flat last year, while average wages generally rose slightly. That meant that FTSE chief executives had to work 34 hours to beat median annual pay, not the 33 hours in 2020.

Better have a lie down on Thursday to recover...

 

[Serge Forward]

But for BBC balance:

However, critics said such analysis just fuels the politics of envy without looking at why chief executives matter and the contribution they make

 

[klang]

But for BBC balance:

fuck me.

 

[Serge Forward]

I know... "they're evil fucking monsters but critics say, such views fail to take into account how great evil fucking monsters are"

 

[Pickman's model]

I wish earn would be replaced by are paid in these discussions of CEO wages. A nurse earns her or his wages, a careworker earns their pay, ftse100 ceos are paid obscene sums of money. There's connotations of working for pay in earning wages and fat pigs don't do anything worth the grand an hour shovelled into their accounts

 

[klang]

I wish earn would be replaced by are paid in these discussions of CEO wages. A nurse earns her or his wages, a careworker earns their pay, ftse100 ceos are paid obscene sums of money. There's connotations of working for pay in earning wages and fat pigs don't do anything worth the grand an hour shovelled into their accounts

or even 'pay themselves'

 

[Serge Forward]

I think the verb "to leech" is greatly underused.

 

[Buddy Bradley]

How much should someone be paid for steering a company in such a way that it can keep employing thousands of other people, then?

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

How much should someone be paid for steering a company in such a way that it can keep employing thousands of other people, then?

The average of all the workers doing the work that earns the money to allow the company to exist.

 

[Smokeandsteam]

Further evidence that the covid economic meltdown/need for hard choices/belt tightening is contingent. The top 1% have had a ‘good pandemic’:

Richest 1% have almost a quarter of UK wealth, study claims

Official figures have missed £800bn of private assets, says thinktank, amid calls for wealth tax to fund Covid recovery

www.theguardian.com

 

[Buddy Bradley]

The average of all the workers doing the work that earns the money to allow the company to exist.

False equivalence. If one worker does their job poorly, they mostly have a tiny effect on the overall company. If the CEO does their job poorly, the company can fail and everyone loses their job.

 

[platinumsage]

Yeah pay footballers the average price of one season ticket.

 

[Smokeandsteam]

How much should someone be paid for steering a company in such a way that it can keep employing thousands of other people, then?

You do know that this isn’t how it works don’t you? CEO’s don’t ‘steer companies’ to allow them to ‘keep employing’ people.

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

Yeah pay footballers the average price of one season ticket.

Footballers' money falls in line with self employed people though, so your analogy doesn't work.

 

[Buddy Bradley]

You do know that this isn’t how it works don’t you? CEO’s don’t ‘steer companies’ to allow them to ‘keep employing’ people.

What do you think they do, then? Spend their day diving into piles of money like Scrooge McDuck?

 

[Serge Forward]

How much should someone be paid for steering a company in such a way that it can keep employing thousands of other people, then?

And that's Jenga!

 

[Smokeandsteam]

What do you think they do, then? Spend their day diving into piles of money like Scrooge McDuck?

What do I think they do? Well, let's see.... 1. Shareholder dividends 2. Market Share 3. New markets/accumulation strategies 4. reducing costs 5. margins 6. merger and acquisitions 7. supply chain refinement

As for what you think they do, do yourself a favour. Have a read of any company annual report to shareholders. Have a look for the section marked 'steering things to keep people employed'. Reflect. The people they happen to employ are a necessary cost overhead. CEO's might spend time examining if they can do the work with fewer of those they must employ, they may examine if they can force those they employ to accept inferior terms, they may try to recruit more of those they need to employ but on a new contract worse than what they previously needed to offer, they may see if they can force those they employ to become ‘self employed’ so they don’t need to offer holiday pay/sick pay etc, they definitely think about if they can offshore their jobs, or contract them out. But 'keep people employed'? A child’s fantasy.

 

[Smokeandsteam]

Here’s the, typical, story of one company Buddy.

Treat yourself to the book and ask yourself as you read: what is the CEO doing here and why?

Capital Moves | The New Press

Globalization is the lead story of the new century, but its roots reach back nearly one hundred years, to major corporations’ quest for stable, inexpensive, and pliant sources of labor. Before the largest companies moved beyond national boundaries, they crossed state lines, abandoning the...

thenewpress.com

 

[Buddy Bradley]

Aside from #1, all of those activities are a necessary part of keeping a business afloat, and therefore keeping people employed (aside from reducing costs by cutting headcount).

 

[Smokeandsteam]

Aside from #1, all of those activities are a necessary part of keeping a business afloat, and therefore keeping people employed (aside from reducing costs by cutting headcount).

What is the motivation, the aim, the priority of the CEO when attending to these tasks.....I'll wait.....

 

[klang]

What is the motivation, the aim, the priority of the CEO when attending to these tasks.....I'll wait.....

...to keep as many very well paid workers on as possible?

 

[ElizabethofYork]

Aside from #1, all of those activities are a necessary part of keeping a business afloat, and therefore keeping people employed (aside from reducing costs by cutting headcount).

Most global logistics companies are investing heavily in AI so that they can reduce their headcount considerably.

 

[muscovyduck]

I might be wrong but average full time workers wage is a good way of bumping up what the average is because it's cut out a lot of the lowest earners who are on unstable contracts, and even then the average workers wage is a lot higher than average income because that figure would exclude everyone on benefits

ETA: An average 25 hours in a bar on an 0 hours contract takes up a lot more of your week than the same 40 hours in an office evey week between mon and fri

Further edit: The .gov income percentiles spreadsheet

 

[Steel Icarus]

I've still got wealth creators unchecked on my bingo card

 

[redsquirrel]

I might be wrong but average full time workers wage is a good way of bumping up what the average is because it's cut out a lot of the lowest earners who are on unstable contracts, and even then the average workers wage is a lot higher than average income because that figure would exclude everyone on benefits

ETA: An average 25 hours in a bar on an 0 hours contract takes up a lot more of your week than the same 40 hours in an office evey week between mon and fri

Further edit: The .gov income percentiles spreadsheet

David Blanchflower piece related to this.

After the financial crisis and the ensuing great recession that started in April 2008, the unemployment rate rose from 5.5% to 7.5% over 12 months. Over the same time period, wage growth – as measured by single-month average weekly earnings in the private sector – also fell sharply. This is what usually happens in a slump. But not this time around, in 2020. Something weird is happening to wage growth. First in the US, and then it spread to the UK.

In the US, there was a big rise in the unemployment rate to just under 20% in April, before falling back steadily to 7.1% in November. But wage growth actually rose sharply, and was 5.9% in November. The picture is the same in the UK. After an initial drop into negative territory earlier this year, there was a sharp rise for -2.9% wage growth to 3.2% in October.

So, everyone is better off right? Actually not. XpertHR, a consultancy specialising in pay, reported that pay settlements limped towards year end with median settlements at 2%.

 

[Buddy Bradley]

What is the motivation, the aim, the priority of the CEO when attending to these tasks.....I'll wait.....

What difference does their motivation make?

 

[Buddy Bradley]

Most global logistics companies are investing heavily in AI so that they can reduce their headcount considerably.

I know - truck driver is the #1 job in the US, so once Tesla or whoever get their self-driving trucks working properly there's going to be a huge change there.

 

[JuanTwoThree]

I suppose if a highly trained motivated and motivating able MD was able to put in massive effort and hours captaining a complex operation to make a reasonable profit for the shareholders and be decent and honourable with the workforce, theyd probably deserve a decent multiple of the other executives' pay.

Big fucking 'if' though

 

[ElizabethofYork]

I know - truck driver is the #1 job in the US, so once Tesla or whoever get their self-driving trucks working properly there's going to be a huge change there.

Yeah but logistics is much more than truck driving. It's manufacturing, warehousing, supply chains, and of course transportation. The logistics sector is a HUGE employer, so when they start heavily implementing AI a whole lot of people are going to be fucked.

 

[Buddy Bradley]

Yeah but logistics is much more than truck driving. It's manufacturing, warehousing, supply chains, and of course transportation. The logistics sector is a HUGE employer, so when they start heavily implementing AI a whole lot of people are going to be fucked.

Indeed - although arguably being a warehouse monkey is so poorly paid and dangerous anyway it's probably better off being done by robots.