Posted on 04/14/2006 1:20:10 PM PDT by aShepard
April 14, 2006— Soaring gas prices are squeezing most Americans at the pump, but at least one man isn't complaining.
Last year, Exxon made the biggest profit of any company ever, $36 billion, and its retiring chairman appears to be reaping the benefits.
Exxon is giving Lee Raymond one of the most generous retirement packages in history, nearly $400 million, including pension, stock options and other perks, such as a $1 million consulting deal, two years of home security, personal security, a car and driver, and use of a corporate jet for professional purposes.
Last November, when he was still chairman of Exxon, Raymond told Congress that gas prices were high because of global supply and demand.
"We're all in this together, everywhere in the world," he testified.
Raymond, however, was confronted with caustic complaints about his compensation.
"In 2004, Mr. Raymond, your bonus was over $3.6 million," Sen. Barbara Boxer said.
That was before new corporate documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission that revealed Raymond's retirement deal and his $51.1 million paycheck in 2005. That's equivalent to $141,000 a day, nearly $6,000 an hour. It's almost more than five times what the CEO of Chevron made.
"I think it will spark a lot of outrage," said Sarah Anderson, a fellow in the global economy program at the Institute for Policy Studies, an independent think tank. "Clearly much of his high-level pay is due to the high price of gas."
Exxon defends Raymond's compensation, pointing out that during the 12 years he ran the company, Exxon became the largest oil company in the world and that the stock price went up 500 percent.
A company spokesman said the compensation package reflected "a very long and distinguished career."
Some Exxon shareholders are now trying to pass resolutions criticizing the company's executive pay policies. The company is urging other shareholders to vote against those resolutions.
So Raymond got:
Salary $4.0 million
Bonus $4.9 million
Stock options $32.0 milion,
Stock Dividends on the stock he owns $3.1 million
Annual pension about $7.0 million, or present cash value of $98 million.
That's on top of the $225 million in stock that he owns, and
Stock options with a market value of $252 million
He should thank OPEC!
And "OPEC pricing?" Please -- dispense with the thoughtless cliches. There's bit more going on in the energy market than "OPEC."
Seems like a lot, but its not my money nor my place to tell Exxon what to do with theirs.
I love the free market. But something is wrong here. How come my neighborhood Exxon station is not offering me newspaper coupons to buy their gas instead of Shell's?
That's the way it works in the pizza business. Something is otta wack here. It's long past time that SOMEBODY looked into how these companies do business. And I mean somebody that can't be bought.
Who? I have no idea.
Time for the Free Traders to chime in and insist that Exxon is just a buncha good ole boys never meanin' no harm, and that we should be glad to pay whatever they ask for gas because they're shining examples of the capitalist ideal.
So what do you want. The government to cap CEO bonuses.
If the stockholders are ok with it, then I'm ok with it.
(*lwp = liberals without principles)
so
Oh yeah.
Raymond is a HUGE 'outsource everything at all costs'. Trust me on this, he move a TON of jobs out of the US for the hell of it.
Bet compensation for Hollywood Producers is up in a down movie market.
if you are going to get top talent to run one of the largest companies in the world, you are going to have to be willing to pay for performance. His compensation contract would have been made years ago, and the reason the package is so big is due to his stock and option holdings, which reflects in great part the financial success of the company and its merger with Mobil. Also worth noting that the bulk of his package is STILL tied to XOM stock price.
I see I got into the wrong line of work.
8.2% profit ain't exactly much to brag about, especially when compared to last years profits in the pharmaceutical (18.5%) and banking industries (18%).
Pretty way of saying, "lobbying."
If you believe what's reported and what's actual is real, then I got some enron stock to sell you.
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