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Fight for Your Right to Vote for CEO Pay
Oct 19, 2010
From the file marked "Good but could go bad," there's this news. We already know that CEO pay has spiked alarmingly over the last decade or so, causing dangerous rifts as ordinary working people struggle to get by and watch their jobs go poof.
Well, the recently-passed Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act had as one of its strongest features the right for shareholders to vote on CEO pay for corporations for which they hold stock. Nice. That means real people that have worked their lives to set aside money for retirement--people with pension funds--would get to vote.
Naturally, corporate executives don't like that. And they're fighting back. The Chamber of Commerce and other big business groups are lobbying the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to change the rules, allowing corporations more control over the voting system by which shareholders can express their opinions.
You can weigh in as well, but you've only got until October 20th to do so. And it'll take a lot of public outrage to outweigh the unlimited amounts of cash that the Chamber of Commerce and other groups can spend.
For more on the Chamber of Commerce and how it does the bidding of big corporations at the expense of small businesses, keep an eye out for our new investigative series, "The Loaded Chamber." The first part comes out this week.
And in the meantime, don't forget to speak up for your right to influence runaway executive pay.
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
© 2023 Laura Flanders
Laura Flanders
Laura Flanders interviews forward-thinking people about the key questions of our time on The Laura Flanders Show, a nationally syndicated radio and television program also available as a podcast. A contributing writer to The Nation, Flanders is also the author of six books, including "Bushwomen: How They Won the White House for Their Man" (2005). She is the recipient of a 2019 Izzy Award for excellence in independent journalism, the Pat Mitchell Lifetime Achievement Award for advancing women's and girls' visibility in media, and a 2020 Lannan Cultural Freedom Fellowship for her reporting and advocacy for public media. lauraflanders.org
From the file marked "Good but could go bad," there's this news. We already know that CEO pay has spiked alarmingly over the last decade or so, causing dangerous rifts as ordinary working people struggle to get by and watch their jobs go poof.
Well, the recently-passed Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act had as one of its strongest features the right for shareholders to vote on CEO pay for corporations for which they hold stock. Nice. That means real people that have worked their lives to set aside money for retirement--people with pension funds--would get to vote.
Naturally, corporate executives don't like that. And they're fighting back. The Chamber of Commerce and other big business groups are lobbying the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to change the rules, allowing corporations more control over the voting system by which shareholders can express their opinions.
You can weigh in as well, but you've only got until October 20th to do so. And it'll take a lot of public outrage to outweigh the unlimited amounts of cash that the Chamber of Commerce and other groups can spend.
For more on the Chamber of Commerce and how it does the bidding of big corporations at the expense of small businesses, keep an eye out for our new investigative series, "The Loaded Chamber." The first part comes out this week.
And in the meantime, don't forget to speak up for your right to influence runaway executive pay.
Laura Flanders
Laura Flanders interviews forward-thinking people about the key questions of our time on The Laura Flanders Show, a nationally syndicated radio and television program also available as a podcast. A contributing writer to The Nation, Flanders is also the author of six books, including "Bushwomen: How They Won the White House for Their Man" (2005). She is the recipient of a 2019 Izzy Award for excellence in independent journalism, the Pat Mitchell Lifetime Achievement Award for advancing women's and girls' visibility in media, and a 2020 Lannan Cultural Freedom Fellowship for her reporting and advocacy for public media. lauraflanders.org
From the file marked "Good but could go bad," there's this news. We already know that CEO pay has spiked alarmingly over the last decade or so, causing dangerous rifts as ordinary working people struggle to get by and watch their jobs go poof.
Well, the recently-passed Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act had as one of its strongest features the right for shareholders to vote on CEO pay for corporations for which they hold stock. Nice. That means real people that have worked their lives to set aside money for retirement--people with pension funds--would get to vote.
Naturally, corporate executives don't like that. And they're fighting back. The Chamber of Commerce and other big business groups are lobbying the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to change the rules, allowing corporations more control over the voting system by which shareholders can express their opinions.
You can weigh in as well, but you've only got until October 20th to do so. And it'll take a lot of public outrage to outweigh the unlimited amounts of cash that the Chamber of Commerce and other groups can spend.
For more on the Chamber of Commerce and how it does the bidding of big corporations at the expense of small businesses, keep an eye out for our new investigative series, "The Loaded Chamber." The first part comes out this week.
And in the meantime, don't forget to speak up for your right to influence runaway executive pay.
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.