CEO lays off 25,000 workers. Gives himself $18 million.

[lucas80]

Nobody knows how hard it is to sit at the top of an organization and be forced to make these decisions. Poor fella.
http://money.cnn.com/2016/02/19/news/companies/schlumberger-ceo-pay-oil-jobs/index.html

 

[markfromj]

What's the issue here?

 

[Wahawk56]

I don't have a problem with the guy getting paid, but if you lost 41% profit and are paying the man in charge 18 mil, yeah you're making bad business decisions.

 

[joelbc1]

Well, I don't think the guy is a Texan....judging by his name.

 

[NoleSoup4U]

Welcome to your liberal utopia, Democrats.

 

[naturalmwa]

Welcome to your liberal utopia, Democrats.

You're entertaining when you drink.

 

[NoleSoup4U]

You're entertaining when you drink.

I'm always entertaining, because I combine facts with flair. I don't just embrace the flair without the facts like most posters on here do.

 

[naturalmwa]

I'm always entertaining, because I combine facts with flair. I don't just embrace the flair without the facts like most posters on here do.

 

[BABiscuit]

I don't have a problem with the guy getting paid, but if you lost 41% profit and are paying the man in charge 18 mil, yeah you're making bad business decisions.

If it wasnt for his steady hand, profits would have been down 60%.

 

[NoleSoup4U]

That was pretty much what I was thinking when I used the word "flair."

I just want to know how you guys are going to curb the corporations when you support government, which is the medium through which corporations use to cheat the common man.

 

[moral_victory]

Poor guy. It is going to take him forever to become a billionaire with such meager bonuses.

 

[who r u]

I'm always entertaining, because I combine facts with flair. I don't just embrace the flair without the facts like most posters on here do.

 

[The Tradition]

Envy is an ugly emotion.

 

[joelbc1]

Envy is an ugly emotion.

Yes it is. As is greed and avarice.

 

[The Tradition]

Look, oil prices have crashed. It costs more to drill it than you can get selling it. Layoffs are necessary in this environment. He could have been a bleeding heart and not laid off anybody, and then the company goes bankrupt, and everybody loses their jobs (instead of only 20% of the employees). He made the correct business move, and is being rightfully compensated for it.

Remember, he can't "give himself" anything. The Board of Directors approves it, along with whether or not he gets to keep his own job as well.

People screaming about CEO pay are mindless idiots. CEO pay is established by the supply and demand for people qualified for the job.

 

[BioHawk]

Look, oil prices have crashed. It costs more to drill it than you can get selling it. Layoffs are necessary in this environment. He could have been a bleeding heart and not laid off anybody, and then the company goes bankrupt, and everybody loses their jobs (instead of only 20% of the employees). He made the correct business move, and is being rightfully compensated for it.

Remember, he can't "give himself" anything. The Board of Directors approves it, along with whether or not he gets to keep his own job as well.

People screaming about CEO pay are mindless idiots. CEO pay is established by the supply and demand for people qualified for the job.

Some of this is true. However, if profits are so low that 25,000 people have to be laid off, then how can the business afford to pay somebody 18 million dollars, just because? You say it's supply and demand, but when teachers, police, or fire use the same reasoning it gets written off as "greedy union thugs wanting to get paid". Can't have it both ways.

 

[The Tradition]

The story also says he was paid $200,000 less this year than he was last year.

 

[The Tradition]

...how can the business afford to pay somebody 18 million dollars, just because?

It's not "just because"... that's the going rate for CEOs in his industry for his company's size. No one is paid at a "just because" rate except for people earning minimum wage. Everyone else is paid what the market dictates (which unions also try and distort).

 

[theIowaHawk]

Look, oil prices have crashed. It costs more to drill it than you can get selling it. Layoffs are necessary in this environment. He could have been a bleeding heart and not laid off anybody, and then the company goes bankrupt, and everybody loses their jobs (instead of only 20% of the employees). He made the correct business move, and is being rightfully compensated for it.

Remember, he can't "give himself" anything. The Board of Directors approves it, along with whether or not he gets to keep his own job as well.

People screaming about CEO pay are mindless idiots. CEO pay is established by the supply and demand for people qualified for the job.

Once again with Trad, literally nothing an employer does can be considered anything but right, correct and worthy of praise.

 

[pablow]

I thought the libs would won't 100% of these jobs gone. Can't be happy with 25,000?

At any rate, off with his head!

 

[thedirtyglass]

CEOs gotta eat, too

 

[Gimmered]

If he would have only paid himself $1 and paid $50,000 to everyone he could keep in a job he still wold have let 24,640 people go. The oil bust hurt a lot of people, many others are benefiting. Free market sucks sometime.

 

[BioHawk]

It's not "just because"... that's the going rate for CEOs in his industry for his company's size. No one is paid at a "just because" rate except for people earning minimum wage. Everyone else is paid what the market dictates (which unions also try and distort).

They just had to cut 25,000 jobs. It is not the going rate for his industry for companies of his size. Sounds to me that they cut 25,000 jobs so the CEO could get 18 million dollars. If it were about maintaining profits because of cheaper oil costs, they wouldn't be paying 18 million in bonuses.

What is it people who support your views always say in the education threads? Times are tough and teachers have to make sacrifices too? Why doesn't that apply for CEO's?

 

[The Tradition]

They just had to cut 25,000 jobs. It is not the going rate for his industry for companies of his size. Sounds to me that they cut 25,000 jobs so the CEO could get 18 million dollars. If it were about maintaining profits because of cheaper oil costs, they wouldn't be paying 18 million in bonuses.

Again, he made LESS money than he did LAST year. You act like he got a bonus for laying off people. Quite the opposite.

 

[dawills]

At $30 a barrel, that is a price of about $.71 per gallon, which is cheaper than buying a gallon of water at hyvee and oil is sure harder to get than water. It would be hard to make money as a producer in this environment, so the jobs have to go if it isn't economic to produce the oil. Its fairly simple. As to the compensation, if he is saving the company probably a billion or more in wages and who knows how many billions in losses on selling the oil itself, then his compensation probably pales in comparison.

 

[86Hawkeye]

Look, oil prices have crashed. It costs more to drill it than you can get selling it. Layoffs are necessary in this environment. He could have been a bleeding heart and not laid off anybody, and then the company goes bankrupt, and everybody loses their jobs (instead of only 20% of the employees). He made the correct business move, and is being rightfully compensated for it.

Remember, he can't "give himself" anything. The Board of Directors approves it, along with whether or not he gets to keep his own job as well.

People screaming about CEO pay are mindless idiots. CEO pay is established by the supply and demand for people qualified for the job.

And if shareholders don't like it, they can fire the board.

 

[NoleSoup4U]

To be the man, you gotta beat the man!

 

[St. Louis Hawk]

To be the man, you gotta beat the man!

And, baby, I'm the man!

 

[22*43*51]

They just had to cut 25,000 jobs. It is not the going rate for his industry for companies of his size. Sounds to me that they cut 25,000 jobs so the CEO could get 18 million dollars. If it were about maintaining profits because of cheaper oil costs, they wouldn't be paying 18 million in bonuses.

What is it people who support your views always say in the education threads? Times are tough and teachers have to make sacrifices too? Why doesn't that apply for CEO's?

Sounds like teachers should become CEO's.

 

[The Tradition]

Sounds like teachers should become CEO's.

Yup. Teachers would make more if there weren't so many teachers.

 

[joelbc1]

20% of the employees).
Remember, he can't "give himself" anything. The Board of Directors approves it, along with whether or not he gets to keep his own job as well.

Your right Trad, he can't. The amorality of corporations and their Boards of Directors is well documented. The collapse of morality in this country can easily be tied back to BoD actions and BoD rationale. People see the BS of everyday business and say, "Why not me?"

 

[86Hawkeye]

Mass layoffs are an excuse for CEOs who aren't good enough to grow the top line.

 

[The Tradition]

Mass layoffs are an excuse for CEOs who aren't good enough to grow the top line.

How do you grow the top line when your product's market price has dropped more than 70 percent?

You're an Iowan? How does a corn farmer stay in business if the price of corn falls 70 percent?

I'll tell you what the farmer does... he leaves his fields unpicked because he loses money on every ear he sells.

 

[joelbc1]

How do you grow the top line when your product's market price has dropped more than 70 percent?

You're an Iowan? How does a corn farmer stay in business if the price of corn falls 70 percent?

The lesson to be learned here is to not f*&k with the Arabs...they can still profit at $20/barrel.......

 

[stout1]

For the idea that CEO pay is market rate or typical for size there is lots of evidence that American CEOs are paid higher than the rest of the world when compared on company size, sales, profit and share price.

Also, in the US corporate boards are primarily made up of people that are in c level positions at other companies. What better way to up one's own salary than upping the salary of a compatriot and then use that data to show that you are now "underpaid". In other countries corporate boards must have 50% of the board members selected from within the employee ranks. Unsurprisingly those board make decisions that benefit the broader good.

But hey, let's ignore the data available. It is what makes 'Merika great.

 

[stout1]

The lesson to be learned here is to not f*&k with the Arabs...they can still profit at $20/barrel.......

Actually they can't. There is a fair bit of internal strife, particularly in Saudi Arabia, where declining oil profits are causing a decrease in domestic price supports on oil, food and other basic goods.

 

[CarolinaHawkeye]

Again, he made LESS money than he did LAST year. You act like he got a bonus for laying off people. Quite the opposite.

He did tank the company.

 

[BioHawk]

Sounds like teachers should become CEO's.

Nah, teachers have way too much empathy and concern for other individual's well being to be a CEO.

 

[lucas80]

The story also says he was paid $200,000 less this year than he was last year.

Poor SOB. His wife is probably going to slash through the coupons in the Sunday paper tomorrow trying to save money on toilet paper.
As mentioned, CEO pay is determined by boards who are usually in the pocket of the CEO. Why not ask the board for $1 million and give $700 in extra severance to the working men and women he axed?

 

[The Tradition]

Poor SOB. His wife is probably going to slash through the coupons in the Sunday paper tomorrow trying to save money on toilet paper.
As mentioned, CEO pay is determined by boards who are usually in the pocket of the CEO. Why not ask the board for $1 million and give $700 in extra severance to the working men and women he axed?

I don't see anything in the story that says whether the laid off workers received severance or not. But of course, that's all regulated by the WARN Act.