business

Japan finding out who gets big pay under new rule

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Wish I could be on this over paid list, sadly, I'm not.

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I'm not an executive so I can't say anything about money. However Ghosn pulled Nissan's fat out of the fire a few years ago and turned it into a profitable company. Perhaps the person who said "Get out" who like to run it themselves?

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and another who stood up to question the pay, demanding that he share it with his workers.

I'm gonna be honest here. I'm jealous that I'm not on that list. However, if it's not you that's on top, you can't demand that a top executive share his earnings with his workers. Sounds like little whiney kids.

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So executives with reasonable paychecks is considered a bad thing?

That kinda goes against the current public opinion in the West, at least, especially after the golden parachutes stories et al. at Wall Street & co.

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A. Don`t trust salary stats. B. In general exec salaries are too high period. Who cares what country you work in. Corporate earnings should be shared with all employees not just a few bigwigs.

Lotsa money in this world but only a few have it. Spread the wealth...

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POV has a good point, I have no probs with top execs etc making a damned good wage, BUT like wallstreet, these last 20yrs has seen pay increase at obscene rates, the people being pissed on wont take it forever, at some point some will do something about it.

These somethings will be of 2 varieties, civil & very violent uncivil, so you top overpaid execs had better start watching yr backs or start making things right a great many of you are making so much $$$$ it wud be hard to figure out what to spend it on without wanting yr own widebody aircraft etc to blow it on

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and a Todai masters graduate who works as an engineer at these makers barely makes 200,000 yen a month, and patiently waits for the years to pass under the amakudari system. an assistant professor at the same Todai (PhD, leading a group of 10 people, and making interesting research) works an average of 12 hours a day, 6 days a week for something around 300,000 a month.

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Todai masters graduate who...... Todai PhD, leading a group of 10 people, and making interesting research)...

Just because they are a graduate of Todai, doesn't mean that they have any business acumen. There is a big difference between "making some interesting research" and developing products that make money for a company.

Corporates pay the money for what you can do, not from where you graduated...

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SoftBank's Son....I want to see his salary.

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"Baseball players made as much, one said."

Uh. Yeah. If they get signed by the Yankees. This comparison fails because a baseball player can be judged according to personal performance, which can be measured in terms of their batting averages, hits, errors, or whatever. As we know, many CEOs are not worth what they are paid. They drive operations into the ground and then take the golden parachute. Japan, in the main, seems to have a decent system that relies on seniority, loyalty, goodwill and good relations with investors, workers, and customers.

“It’s reasonable by global standards,”

Which is exactly why Japan does not need more foreign CEOs. The global standard is greed. The Japanese standard is service to the company and society, and maintenance of a going concern. If BP were a Japanese company the CEO would have killed himself. He would not have gone off to race yachts.

And Goddog, I second that: Son has lost more money for more shareholders than just about anyone I know. If he is not working his tail off to earn it back, I would want to know why. I certainly see him as an excepSON, not the rule.

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If the average employee is getting 3 million then someone getting 100 million would have to be doing the work of 30 people. Simple maths. Ghosn is apparently doing the work of 300 people, which stretches the bounds of credulity a little.

That's the reality of the world of business, if I can hire 149 people for 6 million yen who would be able to do all Ghosn's work then that would be the financially sound decision.

At the end of the day people like Ghosn aren't paid these huge salaries because they do that much work, it's physically impossible for 1 person to do the work of 300, there just aren't that many hours in the day. They get paid these salaries because they and their buddies on the board look at each other and say, "Who wants another Ferrari?", and then they all vote each other a massive raise.

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Wanderlust, a guy at a bank for example has 10 times a higher salary by moving money from one place to another, or speculating on the stock market, than the guy who actually discovers the new stuff that all our modern lives are based on (the Todai was just an example I know firsthand; replace it with Harvard or NASA or Toyota). "developing products that make money for a company". exactly my point: the guy that actually develops the product (researchers, engineers) earn much less than the executives who just talk and vote their salaries, as Frungy said

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I am sure Ghosn, how do you pronounce that, and his cronies did a good job restructuring Nissan, but justifying an income 300 times average, and justifying that by saying (saw this guys face plus attitude on TV last night) as 'still being lower than other execs are getting' I find insulting.

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in many african countries the annual pay can be under 300 usd. like congo per capita gdp of 332$!!!! how can ghosn justify earning the likes 42.000 africans?!!!

not to mention speculative hedge fund managers that rake in as much as 1 billion a year (which by the way is 500.000$ per hour if they work 8h/5days a week)!

ghosn by the way is pronounced like gone, which is what i'd like to see this system that supports such inequality, gone with the wind, the way of slavery.

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I don't think Japanese execs are being over paid, but I do think the US execs are. Especially the wall street crooks.

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These high wages are vulgar andfor the who defend them, well their products are more expensive so the fat cat piggies can enjoy their champagne lifestyles.

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I am gonna be honest here too, I am sure I did not make the list this year! Gosh! Darn it!

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Ever since the introduction of the "traditional corporate governance system" in post-war Japan, corporate management in Japanese corporations enjoyed more liberties than in most Western countries.

Western theory would predict a strong trend to empire-building under relaxed control and indeed, the 1980s and 1990s showed such trend.

Yet, as this article states and many surveys found before, managers barely ever tried to perk that discretion with higher compensation. Instead, they actually put managerial compensation under a taboo.

The question is: Why? And why the change?

The logic would suggest that it's either the little prestige - at least smaller than in Western countries - and the pressure of social norms that deter both ambition and attention in that topic.

Thus, the introduction of this law is a doubled-edged Damocles sword: It suggests that personal restraint is fading and prestige is increasing - but that as a result, the whole corporate governance system will not be able to rely on such relaxed control anymore.

Comments like "I envy to be not on that list." just expresses the devastating effect of open "size-comparing" on the whole system, while outrage about wage inequalities back them up.

You're digging your own grave.

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