10 CEOs Who Got Rich By Squeezing Workers


Corporate profits grew 38.8 percent in 2010, the biggest increase since 1950. But while CEOs earned an average of 20 percent more last year, many Americans continued to lose their jobs and benefits. The insecurity of the middle class has a lot to do with how executives are paid. Bonuses pegged to stock prices encourage CEOs to mercilessly outsource and downsize, slashing costs to boost profits. The result is that more corporate leaders are getting paid at the expense of average workers. Here are 10 of the worst offenders:

Michael T. Duke Walmart Jeffrey R. Immelt General Electric Angela F. Braly WellPoint Mark G. Parker Nike Hugh Grant Monsanto Craig Dubow Gannett Clarence Otis, Jr.Darden Restaurants Gary M. Rodkin ConAgra Foods Keith E. Wandell Harley Davidson
Peter L. Lynch Winn-Dixie

*Duke’s pay would have dropped even more had Walmart not stopped calculating his bonus based on same-store sales, which have declined over the past two years.

 

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DONALD TRUMP & DEMOCRACY

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And we need your support like never before, to fight back against the existential threats American democracy faces. Fundraising for nonprofit media is always a challenge, and we need all hands on deck right now. We have no cushion; we leave it all on the field.

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