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.
Why don't you give Exxon what they want - at the price that they ask - and if you refuse then they will get on the internet and whine that you are damning them for it.
Why would one's occupation matter?
This diverts discussion to something irrelevant, and displays your own lack of interesting or insightful arguments on the topic.
No doubt Mr. Raymond was entitled to his job therefore
entitled to all the perks, unlike us joeblows.
Especially us joeblows who are lowlife, scumbag union members.
Guess you need to quit the Free Republic then...
Obviously, you are not fitting in with us Freepers, since you think us all Socialists.
So, go on now, git!
Since ABC and those it usually polls are very liberal...
... and that those liberals think (90%) that the position that the retirement package is fair...
... then that position is a liberal one.
:-)
Should this apply to you as well?
So anyone not making a fraction of what you earn has reason to berate you, your salary, claim you don't deserve it, say that 'the system' is broken, and that you are a gluttonous jerk?
The problem with this plan is that it is stealing.
You are also suggesting some kind of slavery, where one's freedom can only be earned by returning wages that were earned legally.
You do not have to buy gas every 300 miles, or ever.
You adopted that habit and lifestyle yourself, and now you expect others to subsidize it.
Notice I was being sarcastic; I just wanted to see if anyone on this thread (which is crawling with populists) would actually support a proposal that ridiculous.
Yup. Too many of the so-called 'economics' masters here on this thread have no understanding of an elastic/inelastic demand.
Or that the demand for gasoline is inelastic.
How and why would you complicate the matter?
Check! :-)
Personally, I don't think that this guy should be rewarded one extra cent for a company that fully benefitted from OPEC's pricing policy, and then headed the squandering of the resulting cash flow.
So, that's my problem view of Fatso Raymond walking away with this years $400 million, on top of the more than $500 million he has already been awarded in stock value!
My problem with Exxon goes much deeper.
See my #634
Hardly. I'm all for capitalism, but there is also something that shouldn't smack of obscene. This is obscene.
If I were a member of the Board, I'd make sure the executives are compensated very well, however I'd seek balance, not plunder. This is a publicly traded company with probably millions of shareholders and pension funds that are owners. I'd think longer term planning of the economic challenges and capital needs facing the company are more important than making one CEO feel like a Rockefeller. Sorry, he's one man, and although he contributed to the current success of the company, so did his lieutenants, his work force, market conditions and his board of directors. The company was there before he joined, it'll be there after, he's one of a string of CEO's that will come and go, and he didn't create the company from scratch, either. That kind of risk taking deserves the extreme reward when it occurs, not this situation.
And as for the system being broken; I didn't claim that it was, however, I think short-term planning only (quarterly driven) will contribute to it's crippling in the long run. Greed can be a wonderful motivator and a terrible wrecker. There is a balance to be pursued. Period.
I didn't. I just recognize that it's not simple.
But I suspect you already knew that.
Which removes it from all the constraints of the so-called free market.
This is where the traders come in and tell you things like "Walk. Ride a bike. Don't drive. Yadayadayada."
As though, in a society structured on cheap energy, you now have the alternative of pretending it's not ... overnight.
"You read that correctly...58 Billion in taxes on fuel alone.."
True...but these huge quarterly profits for Big Oil aren't due to over-taxation. They aren't due to price of barrel of oil.
So where is the gouging coming from?
Simplton Americans think that "OIL" companies get all of their profit from Gasoline...which is as far from the truth as it gets...
A main source of their income is the mere fact that they are dealing a commodity that has since last year nearly doubled in value.
Instead of acting like Americans and using the contract or equity markets to hedge themselves...most choose to whine like socialist crybabys...demanding that their sugar daddy government tax the oil companys...
And of course we know that if the oil companys were slapped with a windfall tax, the price of gas would shoot up, and the slime bags in Washington would never roll back the tax. Further, you can bet that the tax would be used to fund yet even more pork crap...
Ridiculous...
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.