Executive pay is zooming skyward again after pausing a few years for the recession

But corporate watchdogs are hopeful that the most egregious pay practices can be reined in as new 'say-on-pay' votes and other investor-friendly rules take effect.

By Kathy M. Kristof
LA Times
May 29, 2011

The $6.4 million that Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. paid Chief Executive Craig Martin last year normally wouldn't have raised many eyebrows.

Sure, the amount was a lot more than most of us could ever hope to make for a mere 12 months' work. But it also was well below the average CEO compensation at California's 100 biggest public companies — and less than one-tenth the remuneration of the executives at the top of that ladder.

Still, Martin's pay gained uncomfortable attention when a majority of the Pasadena company's shareholders voted not to approve it at the firm's annual meeting in January — marking the first "no" vote in the country in newly required "say-on-pay" ballots.

Since then, shareholders of more than 20 other companies nationwide have rejected their top managers' pay packages, and more such rebuffs are expected in the months ahead.

(More here.)