Exec Pay Rises as Stocks Fall

What seems to be an inverse reaction to sagging stock prices are the perceptively oversized pay packages of some of America's highest-earning CEOs.

A USA Today survey of the pay for the top 50 largest companies in the Standard & Poor's 500 showed the median compensation last year was $15.7 million. The analysis included data compiled by Salary.com for those companies that filed proxies by the end of March.

Boards of directors are increasingly linking pay to performance. "This is a jump-ball year," Jeffrey Cunningham, chairman and CEO of Directorship magazine, told USA Today. "We get the message. Directors are at the negotiating table with their CEOs, looking for rationale pay schemes; no funny business, no games--just pure performance-driven pay planning."

The story also points out that compensation lags market performance and that attitude is being reflected particularly in the hard hit retail, home building, and finance sectors.

"Bonsues are definitely following profits, especially in the retail and financial sectors," said Ira Kay of Watson Wyatt, a compensation consulting firm.