Besides the interesting scaling on that graph, it only covers CEO pay, not total compensation. So I'm guessing stock options and the like were not included.

I read a few of the comments there, and got my FDA daily allowance for derp.

DeltaPunch: They might be 1%ers, but their pay has gone down because the 0.1%ers have gotten even richer...



Dance, my little CEO monkeys! DANCE!

Skleenar: I didn't realize we had an out voting system. That sounds FAAAAAAABULOUS!

Please stop doing this. Please.

MFL: Yes but one of those is seen everyday at every grocery store in America

Silly naive farker, rich people don't shop for themselves at grocery stores.

unexplained bacon: I think this sort of misinformation isn't so much to convince liberals, it's to make GOPers feel better.

/no critical thinking needed.

THIS. It's like when all the hens at Fox News got their feathers in a bunch because Obama used a cheap binder clip to hold the jobs bill together. ("OMG, he must not really care about this massive effort if he just slaps it together with a 50-cent binder clip!! LOLZA!11!")

It's petty. It's childish. It's stupid. It's transparent. It has nothing to do with policy. It's done to reinforce what the mouthbreathers already think about Obama. And right now, it's just about all the GOP is capable of mustering.

CapnBlues: EnviroDude: CapnBlues: EnviroDude: CapnBlues: i wonder which candidate would most favor such generosity and humanity.

Obama, because he extended them?

i said MOST favor, dipshiat. fark off out of my face with that shiat. you can go fark yourself somewhere.

Sorry, if I had known you wanted to exempt POTUS (and candidate for reelection) Obama, who has extended the Bush tax cuts to protect the rich, from your list, I would not have mentioned him. He obviously is the candidate that favors them the most (IMO).

i told you to fark off out of my face with that shiat.

MOST FAVOR. How about the guy who has 200 million dollars in the stock market himself? i wonder if that guy favors tax cuts on the rich any more than Obama, who repeatedly campaigns for a millionaire tax?

look, i'm not saying obama is a friend to the poor. i'm saying he's less of an enemy than any of the republican candidates, who either expressly aren't concerned about the poor or have some bizarre believe that eliminating services for the poor will somehow help them.

god, now i remember why i had you ignored. leave me alone, please.

Relax. He's trying out an old TP, give him a break. Of course, anyone with any memory of the tax extension debate knows that Obama was one of a few voices clamoring to extend only those tax cuts (from 2003) on people who were making less than 250k/year. "Tax cuts for the rich" was then, and continues to be, a Republican Leadership issue.

It's election season though, so people are here that aren't normally paying attention. Some people like to take advantage of the glut of political interest by misrepresenting things, telling half-truths or flat out lying. Most of us have been down that road already. Maybe upwards of a dozen times... in the last few months alone. So we're tired of explaining it AGAIN.

These people are counting on the fact that we're sick of that kind of disingenuousness and will just ignore it, while the extra 10 - 25% that is invisibly lurking and trying to catch up on the last 4 years of politics is going to leave here very confused.

FUD.

TruFax yo:
The Bush Tax Cuts for the Wealthy were lumped in with The Bush Tax Cuts for Everyone Else. That's common sense of course. But against the wishes of the white house, the brokered compromise that hit his desk ALSO lumped in the 13 month unemployment extension AND the a one year SS tax cut. Basically right before Christmas, Obama signed a bill that had 9 of the 9 things he wanted... with one thing he actively wanted removed from it. And it's a good thing too, because that Christmas needed to see an increase in seasonal purchasing, and an increase in seasonal employment (to drive that purchasing past the end of the season and into the next fiscal year).

In EnviroDude's POV, this means that Obama favors tax cuts for the rich more than *anyone else*.

And this concerns (new window)him greatly.

rustypouch: I read a few of the comments there, and got my FDA daily allowance for derp.

this one just gave me an aneurism:

I've always wondered, if someone doesn't have skin in the game (read: pay taxes, as in income taxes), why are they allowed to vote?

Although...I guess it really doesn't matter anymore since, "The people who cast the votes don't decide an election, the people who count the votes do." - Joseph Stalin

AND

We're fast approaching a point of no return because logic, and Benjamin Franklin tells us, "When the people find they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic."

Depends on how exactly you're looking at it. The usual process of analyzing a data set tends to exclude outliers when trying to establish trends, though, so comparing CEO pay (an outlier almost by definition) with the group comprising the vast majority of incomes ("workers" in general) seems like it would be an uninformative metric in general.

I would suspect that the more meaningful measures of income disparity are comparing something like the modal income and mean income or the difference between two peaks on the income chart. One would also have to correlate that metric to socially detrimental effects, since there's not necessarily anything wrong with some people being richer than others in itself.

Yes, it's true, that after seeing 30 years of data, not only did supply-side economics not live up to expectations, it made matters worse, but don't worry, it's just a glitch.

We just need another decade or two for that wealth to trickle down and then, America will be an economic paradise.

I_C_Weener: Yet liberals hate Walmart, and not McDonald's


Why do you assume this is correct?

I don't like either of them. Of course I'm not a 'liberal'

Since CEO's are the scum of the earth, why don't we just have the Unions run the corporations and every worker can make a million dollars a year with all the cash saved from eliminating management. Obviously we just need to pay our workers more so they are more productive in the global economy. Management was just stealing that money anyway and there is plenty of it to go around.

ultraholland: MadeuLaTerestrian: I believe the sawdust comes from rare rainforest old growth forests.

and their "coffee" is just fresh-squeezed capybara juice

french fries=marmoset fingers.

/makes about as much sense as the article.
//mmm...marmoset.

MFL: Since CEO's are the scum of the earth, why don't we just have the Unions run the corporations and every worker can make a million dollars a year with all the cash saved from eliminating management. Obviously we just need to pay our workers more so they are more productive in the global economy. Management was just stealing that money anyway and there is plenty of it to go around.

did you know that there are more colors in the world than black and white?

Also, the poor have refrigerators. REFRIGERATORS!!!

Because People in power are Stupid
That writer has issues with the concept of cause and effect. is a far right wing shill and a liar, but I repeat myself.

Fixed!

We could just cut CEO pay to 1% of current levels. This will assure that those taking the position truly care more about the company and not the pay... like teachers today.

MFL: Since CEO's are the scum of the earth, why don't we just have the Unions run the corporations and every worker can make a million dollars a year with all the cash saved from eliminating management. Obviously we just need to pay our workers more so they are more productive in the global economy. Management was just stealing that money anyway and there is plenty of it to go around.

If you keep blowing them like that, I promise that pretty soon a CEO will fark you.

Over.

Jim_Callahan: Depends on how exactly you're looking at it. The usual process of analyzing a data set tends to exclude outliers when trying to establish trends, though, so comparing CEO pay (an outlier almost by definition) with the group comprising the vast majority of incomes ("workers" in general) seems like it would be an uninformative metric in general.

I would suspect that the more meaningful measures of income disparity are comparing something like the modal income and mean income or the difference between two peaks on the income chart. One would also have to correlate that metric to socially detrimental effects, since there's not necessarily anything wrong with some people being richer than others in itself.

Sure, he could have done that, but it wouldn't have given him the result he wanted. Hell, the best spin he could come up with: noticing that in 2008 a CEO only earned over 250 times what the workers did instead of over 500 in 2000, doesn't put income equality in a good light. This guy is no Winston writing that the chocolate rations have increased to 25 grams, he's more like the "fattish but active man of paralyzing stupidity, a mass of imbecile enthusiasms - one of those completely unquestioning, devoted drudges on whom, more even than on the thought police, the stability of the Party depended."

get used to it.
this is obama's campaign strategy;

class warfare.

you're gonna get a belly full of it...

MFL

Mitt Romney made 20.9 million dollars last year without working for it at all. I made a little over 6000 dollars.

Who's the real leech on society?

/I don't begrudge people who work for their money and are compensated because they're good at what they do, although as a society I think some of the ones on top should probably be paying higher tax rates to pay for social security/medicare stability and whatnot.
//I do begrudge people who make more money than they'll ever be able to spend for shiat like "investment income" or cushy CEO jobs earned by knowing the board of directors with million-dollar severance packages if they screw up.

colon_pow: get used to it.
this is obama's campaign strategy;

class warfare.

you're gonna get a belly full of it...

Hopefully you are right and Obama will be pointing out the effects of the class warfare that has been directed at the lower and middle classes for the past 3 decades or so.

This needs to be required reading in every high school:

Dusk-You-n-Me: MFL: Obviously we just need to pay our workers more so they are more productive in the global economy.

German autoworkers, nearly all of which are unionized, make twice as much as their American counterparts. And yet, as if by magic, these German auto companies still make healthy profits.

So does Ford. GM and Chrysler fail more because of incompetent management in general than the single point of incompetent management illustrated by excessive executive pay.

Similarly, Toyota plants operating within the US, which run under US laws and largely the same traditions regarding employment, are doing just peachy, thanks.

//It's not like they're going to make all the cars in Japan and then float them over on boats, that would be stupid. They're made in the US, Canada, and Mexico if they're sold here, for the most part. As are most "German" cars you see on American roads.

I_C_Weener: Lando Lincoln: I_C_Weener: Lando Lincoln: I_C_Weener: Yet liberals hate Walmart, and not McDonald's. McDonald's provides worse wages, worse quality, and is non-union (I have no idea, I just made that up...maybe there is a fry cook union).

I was unaware that most of McDonald's products are now made in China.

Are you somehow saying McDonald's products are superior to Walmart's?

I'm saying that you don't understand why we don't like Walmart. The low wages and non-union thing is a small part of it. The fact that they come in to an area and decimate small businesses is a larger issue. The fact that they have a business model that practically forces their suppliers into moving their factories away from the United States and into other countries is the largest issue.

And still, you are fine with McDonald's poisoning your fellow countrymen slowly every day. You sir, are a poor American.

Walmart provides goods and services to even the poorest of us at a price we can afford. Sure, its Roflex watches and Panatonic televisions. But those don't poison our people. They don't cause us to ingest food that is unfit to serve to animals under the FDA rules.

No sir, your hate for Walmart blinds you to the good they provide and the harm provided by the Golden Arches. And yet, this thread is about CEO pay compared to worker pay...and McDonald's CEOs make 100 times that what the lowly french fry technician makes. You find that admirable? I do not good sir.

I will not support a morally corrupt organization that presents us with fake meat and low wages. You do what you want, but I will not sit here and listen to you insult what could be in the United States of America.

The fries are the best though.

colon_pow: get used to it.
this is obama's campaign strategy;

class warfare.

you're gonna get a belly full of it...

ronald reagan's defunct
who used to ride a watersmooth-silver stallion and break
onetwothreefourfive commiesjustlikethat

Jesus he was a handsome man and what i want to know is

how do you like your blueeyed boy

Mister Death

birdboy2000:

//I do begrudge people who make more money than they'll ever be able to spend for shiat like "investment income" or cushy CEO jobs earned by knowing the board of directors with million-dollar severance packages if they screw up.

You sound young.

ultraholland: rustypouch:

We're fast approaching a point of no return because logic, and Benjamin Franklin tells us, "When the people find they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic."

OK, what's up with the idiots attributing this to Ben Franklin? The closest thing to this would be from Alexis de Tocqueville, in Democracy in America where he actually has a couple of variations on it. Has the "right" just decided that all the good quotes need to be redistributed to proper American sources? Perhaps they just can't bring themselves to admit that a Frenchman wrote something they agree with.

/Could be that they are afraid of their friends finding out they can read

Jim_Callahan:

So does Ford. GM and Chrysler fail more because of incompetent management in general than the single point of incompetent management illustrated by excessive executive pay.


When exactly did Ford fail?

/Must have missed that part.

MFL: Obviously we just need to pay our workers more so they are more productive in the global economy.

Dusk-You-n-Me German autoworkers, nearly all of which are unionized, make twice as much as their American counterparts. And yet, as if by magic, these German auto companies still make healthy profits.

USA Unions = Equality.
German Unions = Quality.

USA Unions = adversarial
German Unions = collaborative

USA corporate tax = 35%
Germany Corp tax = 15%

I_C_Weener: Because People in power are Stupid: That writer has issues with the concept of cause and effect.
The AFL -CIO chart that he uses exclusively to justify his thesis that Bushies tenure lowered the disparity between rich and poor had everything to do with the recession and very little to do with Repugnantan's in office mandating lower CEO pay.

Most CEO's get a portion of their pay through exercised stock options which makes no sense if said stock values are in the toilet.

[i586.photobucket.com image 520x187]

Aside from the weirdness of the graph showing the latter 10 years to be twice the length of the prior 20, it appears that the lowering of CEO pay started with his getting in office. Either you are giving him credit for creating a booming economy for 7.5 of his 8 years during a "recession" or you are being disingenuous. Or maybe you are saying the lowering of salaries from 2000 to 2007.5 are all due to the 2008 recession.

Also keep in mind that CEO compensation shifted away from wages toward bonuses since bonuses are taxed at about 10% and wages at 36%. I am betting that the graph does not take into account FULL compensation.

MFL: MFL: Obviously we just need to pay our workers more so they are more productive in the global economy.

Dusk-You-n-Me German autoworkers, nearly all of which are unionized, make twice as much as their American counterparts. And yet, as if by magic, these German auto companies still make healthy profits.

USA Unions = Equality.
German Unions = Quality.

USA Unions = adversarial
German Unions = collaborative

USA corporate tax = 35%
Germany Corp tax = 15%

Tell us are US corporations collaborative or adversarial ?

Wow. They sure busted that news.

A Dark Evil Omen: MFL: ince CEO's are the scum of the earth, why don't we just have the Unions run the corporations

Good idea. Let's do it.

Since Germany's been invoked, it's interesting to note that, by law, a worker representative must be given a seat on the board in larger German corporations. Not a union officer, a member, or sometimes not even a union member, to represent the regular workers when a change is being considered.

"All in favor of raising our stock prices .01 by moving all production to Malaysia, say aye."
"Um, wait a minute..."

DeltaPunch
This is quite possibly the stupidest plot I've ever seen. Seriously, look closely at the numbers, then look at the supposed "scale" of the y-axis. It just doesn't make sense.

The line spacing is roughly equal to 50 if you look at the difference between 107 and 42, but then it's also equal to 100 when you look at 364 and 263.

Seriously, its just as bad as that Obama economic growth chart that compares it against 6 months of the Bush economic collapse. Come on, at least compare it against all 8 years of Bush.

But really, the problem has nothing to do with the scale. I would assume the issue is that changes in the tax code to lower capital gains and dividend income shifted CEO pay away from the standard salary and towards stock options. The article doesnt define how CEO pay is calculated, so who knows. Anyway, just wanted to knock the "Omg the scale/time periods/prettyness of the graph sucks so its invalild" argument.

Average income inequity is not the problem, it's that 15% of the population lives in poverty. And before someone says, well maybe they should work harder, 90% of the households in the US getting assistance from the government have 1 or more full time employed people. Those people born in the bottom 1/5th of income per household have a 55% chance of being something over than in poverty by the time they die, however those in the top 1/5th of income per household have a 92% chance of not ending up in poverty. IE it's a cycle that the poor get suck in, and the inequity between them and the middle class has grown greatly.

This guy tells half truths, gives half the info and then draws conclusions that are not supported when you actually look at the numbers instead of trying to make them say what you want.

Oh, and if we just measure disposable income the amount that bottom 4/5th of earners have is decreasing at a rate far faster than the rate that top 1/5th of earners disposable income is dropping. IE income inequity for real world disposable income is increasing at a rapid rate.

birdboy2000

Mitt Romney made 20.9 million dollars last year without working for it at all. I made a little over 6000 dollars.Who's the real leech on society?

No offense.....but obviously you.

A. Mitt Romney has created hundreds of thousands of jobs restructuring companies. You seem barely able to hold one.

B. Mitt Romney paid over 3 million dollars in capital gains from his nest egg interest to the gov't after paying millions upon millions of dollars accumulating that nest egg....at 6K you paid zero income tax.

C. Mitt Romney's investments in things like "stocks" and "bonds" provide capital for municipalities and corporations to function and expand. He earns interest for the risk he takes just like every other american who has a 401K. At 6K a year I doubt you are investing in much of anything.

I'm not trying to sound harsh because I know what it feels like to fall on hard times, but you asked the question.

I'm sure you are worth more than 6K a year if you are willing to work. What is your skill set and what have you done to market yourself?

MFL: A. Mitt Romney has created hundreds of thousands of jobs restructuring companies. You seem barely able to hold one.

Hundreds of thousands? Is that the claim that his campaign has never actually been able to back up?