“Marissa Mayer will pocket $186 million when Verizon fully acquires Yahoo next month — in yet another example of a CEO being paid for luck rather than performance,” Steven Clifford writes for The New York Post. “Yahoo’s core business stagnated under Meyer’s leadership. However, when she took the job, she inherited Yahoo’s 15 percent stake in Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce colossus. Alibaba’s increasing value caused Yahoo stock to double over her five-year tenure. And so Meyer will be rewarded handsomely for the stocks and options she holds in her company — for essentially doing nothing. This is how ‘pay-for-performance’ works in corporate America.”
“‘Pay-for-luck’ means that CEO performance and rewards are completely divorced. The Wall Street Journal’s 2014 pay survey found that only one of the 10 highest-paid CEOs ranked among the top 10 percent by investor performance. Five rigorous academic studies have found little, or even negative correlation between CEO pay and performance,” Clifford writes. 
“If that happened, the resulting outrage might become so intense that boards and politicians would seriously consider curbing excessive CEO compensation. My favorite remedy is a luxury tax, a levy used by Major League Baseball to control player salaries,” Clifford writes. “The IRS should do the same to corporations. For every dollar over $6 million that a company pays an executive, it should pay a dollar in luxury tax to the US government. This would include all forms of compensation including gains on stock options and golden parachutes.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Why pay it directly to the government? You like wasting money? In 2015, the federal budget was $3.8 trillion or roughly $12,000 for every woman, man and child in the United States.
We don’t have a trillion-dollar debt because we haven’t taxed enough; we have a trillion-dollar debt because we spend too much. — Ronald Reagan
The American people are not undertaxed, the government in Washington is overfed. — Ronald Reagan
Why must everything that moves (or not) be taxed? If you like this luxury tax idea, why not make it law that every dollar over $X million (we’re not sure where Clifford came up with $6 million; was he thinking of Steve Austin?) that a company pays an executive, it must pay a dollar back to the shareholders in the form of dividends (which, of course, will be taxed anyway)? That would have the same effect of tamping down executive compensation, but it would also stimulate investment (as many people reinvest dividends) and the economy at the same time.
SEE ALSO:
CEO Marissa Mayer drops the ax, shutters about half of Yahoo’s content verticals – February 17, 2016
Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer gets a chance to make one last stand – February 3, 2016
Yahoo to lay off 15% of staff, close five offices, explore non-strategic asset sales – February 2, 2016
Yahoo investors running out of patience with CEO Marissa Mayer – January 4, 2016
Hedge fund manager blasts Marissa Mayer for equipping employees with 22,000 iPhones – January 4, 2016
Yahoo board to weigh future of company, Marissa Mayer, source says – December 2, 2015
Yahoo or Microsoft can terminate search deal anytime on or after October 1st – April 21, 2015
Microsoft loses exclusivity in Yahoo search deal shake up – April 17, 2015
Yahoo gains further US search share; Google falls below 75% for first time – February 3, 2015
Microsoft, Yahoo vie to become Apple Safari’s default search option – November 26, 2014
Firefox dumps Google for default U.S. search, switches to Yahoo/Bing – November 20, 2014
Yahoo’s Marissa Mayer was right to ban working from home, right? – August 12, 2014
Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer wants to save Google a billion dollars – April 18, 2014
Yahoo’s strategy: Rebuild search, take share, win iOS from Google – April 17, 2014
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Lynn Weiler” for the heads up.]
Pretty good wages for being incompetent. Sign me up.
I can drive Yahoo into the ground for a fraction of that.
…sure, simply fill-out an application at the DNC.
So predictable, bothead. News flash – incompetence is egalitarian in nature. For instance, there is you and multibillionaire, bloviating egomaniac Trump who apparently has a difficult time reading more than a few sentences unless his name is included in a “winning” way.
The proof of your stupidity is that you do not even realize that you are wrong much of the time.
be careful, there pal, or I’ll have to bodyslam your happy ass into the turnbuckle.
bwhahahahahahaha
Like Gianforte you’re a coward. He couldn’t handle a simple question so he resorted to violence. You can’t handle simple statements so you resort to nonsense.
What a shame you exist
oh, but I do Littlest Princess, but I do!
There is a big difference between “winning”, speaking collectively as the greatest nation on earth…and true, clinical, megalomania:
“Did he forget about the voters? Obama says the words ‘I’ and ‘me’ a total of 117 times in ONE speech”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2171006/Video-President-Obama-says-words-I-total-117-times-ONE-speech.html
There is ego, and then there’s EGO
i.me.mine
i.me.mine
i.me.mine
i.me.mine
The election is over. You lost. Get over it. Suck it up.
Didn’t MDN used to praise Marissa a lot? Wasn’t there even some talk about wanting Marissa to serve as Apple’s CEO? I certainly recall numerous revisits to the photo with the red ball.
No doubt. I’ll even wear the dress and sit on the stability ball while I pretend to have any managerial ability whatsoever. Bring on the riches!
Regarding the quotes from former President Reagan: wise words indeed.
There are, as those of use who think already know, two opposing forces in #MyStupidGovernment that create the almost eternally mounting federal deficit.
Republicans: The worst of them want to pull this evil trickery, which of course has been proven to be utterly insane and worthless as a concept. Typically this lamebrain philosophy creates a bloated military budget and therefore massive deficit.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starve_the_beast
Democrats: The worst of them want the opposite, which is to have the US government running everything, going dire socialist. Typically, this lamebrain philosophy creates bloated taxation that still can’t cover the bloated bureaucracy and extraneous entitlement spending.
Result: Two worthless political parties creating ‘Bankruptcy all round!’
Imagine a sane government with sane goals, sane spending and constantly balanced budgets in times of relative peace, like right now!
It could happen!
Ronald Reagan did NOT make it happen. At the end of his presidency, he had the highest deficit spending record of any President in history. Oops.
And now for comment warz about every other President’s spending since Reagan. I think I’ll Duck and Cover. (^_^)
Flames and down votes mean nothing when you speak the truth, DC. Reagan’s supply side tax cut fantasy in combination with massive defense spending did result in huge deficits. The only reason that the economy improved is because he started with 13% long term interest rates. As those rates eased downwards, the economy improved. Simple.
And, of course, people tend to forget the massive stock market crash of 1987 during the Reagan Administration. They also forget the S&L meltdown which occurred because of rules changes for banks. Reagan was no paragon of POTUSness, although he almost seems so in comparison to the TRUMPanzee.
Clinton balanced the budget.
Yes indeed. But of course this has never been up to just a President. Clinton had cooperation with the House and Senate, who also get credit.
Then the Neo-Cons took power in the GW Bush White House and it all went to HELL. To this day we’re still blowing outrageous tax payer money on an almost worthless war in Afghanistan, making the USSR’s defeat there look minor in comparison.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet–Afghan_War
https://www.nationalpriorities.org/cost-of/war-in-afghanistan/
Every hour, taxpayers in United States are paying $4 million for Cost of War in Afghanistan.
At the moment the cost of that war has been $773 Billion.
You lie. Like a typical Democrat.
The Republican Revolution – Newt Gingrich and company –
balanced the budget. Clinton was just there when it happened.
Reagan outspent the USSR and won the cold war, dunce.
Live in the meme, die in the meme.
I thankfully get out of the box on a frequent basis and enjoy sharing what I see with others.
Meaningless drivel. Reagan spent the USSR into oblivion. He knew they could not compete. He did what nearly everyone thought was impossible. Reagan and Pope John Paul II won the Cold War without firing a shot.
Meanwhile, the best the Democrat Party can offer is:
I don’t ever give a rat’s what your write, not any more. Puke on a page. Ignorant, insincere, idiotic blahblah.
And stop pretending I have ANY idolization for the DemoCraps. You don’t give a rat’s ass what I write. You just want an excuse to puke the propaganda.
I puke back at you.
Is this the same woman that was sitting on the big red rubber ball photo?
Yes.
thx
it deflated…
heh
— for essentially doing nothing
That’s my impression of Marissa Mayer’s accomplishments at Yahoo. The fact that they were literally PWNed four years ago and they never bothered to tell anyone yells out the fact that the place is a blundering mess. It’s been a mess since I started having to deal with them after they bought eGroups, who became Yahoo Groups. The place is a PITA.
Have fun Verizon! You bought/brought in on yourselves.
And David Pogue? It’s time to jump ship again.
Look at the headline. It’s everything wrong with American capitalism in just 13 words.
She’s cute. I say fine. I’ll ok the signing of the check.
Crony capitalism rewards failure. Obviously, India is not the only country with a caste system. Get used to it, serfs.
You need to look up the definition of Crony Capitalism. While you’re there, look up capitalism as well.
What MDN and other right wings fools never acknowledge is that they are talking about taxing the super-rich equitably. The rich are like a bad business partner: they skim the profits and don’t pay their fair share.
I don’t understand why you defend the rich when they are perfectly able to rig the game and defend themselves. They don’t need you slavish lap dogs to get away with this kind of outlandish pay.
I miss the red ball photo too. It became sexist and had to go. But yowza!