St. Elias Mines

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Is our CEO over compensated?

St. Elias Mines

over 10 years ago

In the article below, perhaps many surprises. I put this on here because of concern I had and still have, where the compensation committee for SLI approved an increase in Lori,s compensation, from $5000 per month, to $7500 per month. This compensation increase was a 50% hike and came at a time that our treasury was severly dwindling, fall of 2012, and just before the Dec 2012 AGM. Not only was the CEO,S salary increased, there was also perhaps a "parachute" approved for the CEO, should she part from the company.

I picked out a comparison excerpt to present perhaps an imbalance and ask a question; are these people really worth getting this much a year?; Shareholders are paying these guys salaries;

"The centre says CEO pay for Canadian public companies listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange has ballooned by 73 per cent between 1998 and 2012, the latest figures available.

In contrast, the average Canadian full-time worker's annual salary has only grown by six per cent during this period."

Updated: Thu, 02 Jan 2014 15:00:00 GMT | By Linda Nguyen, The Canadian Press, thecanadianpress.com

Average top Canadian CEO salary: $7.96M

By the time you finish lunch on Thursday, Canada's top paid CEOs will have already earned the equivalent of your annual salary.

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Luke MacGregor/Reuters; Leonhard Foeger/Reuters; Mark Blinch/ReutersShow Thumbnails

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The most well-compensated leaders of industry in Canada (salary figures are from 2011), according to the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.

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TORONTO - It may be hard to swallow, but according to an annual review by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, by 1:11 p.m. on Jan. 2, the average top paid Canadian CEO will have been earned as much as the average full-time worker's yearly income.

The review found the average compensation among Canada's top 100 CEOs was $7.96 million in 2012. This compared with the average annual Canadian worker's salary of $46,634.

The centre says CEO pay for Canadian public companies listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange has ballooned by 73 per cent between 1998 and 2012, the latest figures available.

In contrast, the average Canadian full-time worker's annual salary has only grown by six per cent during this period.

This amounts to the country's top 100 highest-paid CEOs making 171 times the earnings of an average Canadian wage — a jump from 105 times in 1998.

Meanwhile, minimum wage workers employed for 40 hours a week earned an average of $20,989 a year in 2012.

"Compensation packages paid to chief executive officers have come under intense scrutiny and pressure from shareholders, the media, and the general public. There is no clear relationship between CEO compensation and any measure of corporate performance," said the report's author Hugh Mackenzie in a statement.

"But despite the scrutiny, the pay of CEOs in Canada and elsewhere has proven to be remarkably resilient."

The review found the top-earning executive in Canada was the head of the Canadian Pacific Railway (TSX:CP), Hunter Harrison, who was paid $49.1 million in salary, stock options and bonuses in 2012.

Harrison, who retired as chief executive at Canadian National Railway Co. (TSX:CN) in 2009, saw his pay packet boosted some $44.5 million to make up for pension and other payments that CN refused to make when he took the top job at the rival railway.

The second-highest paid CEO was James Smith of Thomson Reuters Corp. (TSX:TRI), who took home $18.8 million, followed by former Talisman Energy Inc.(TSX:TLM) chief executive John Manzoni who pocketed $18.67 million in 2012.

The lowest-paid CEO on the top 100 list was Lino A. Saputo, of Montreal-based dairy Saputo Inc. (TSX:SAP), who earned $3.85 million.

The review also pointed out that three women made it onto the list in 2012 — Linda Hasenfratz, CEO of Linamar Corp. (TSX:LNR), Dawn Farrell, CEO of TransAlta Corp. (TSX:TA), and Nancy Southern, CEO of ATCO Ltd. (TSX:ACO.X).

In 2011, only one female executive was in the top 100 ranking.