上周四，眾議院將圍繞一項旨在對華爾街解綁的計劃進行投票，該計劃旨在廢除奧巴馬時代針對企業CEO的幾項薪酬改革，比如禁止對銀行家發放高額獎金以避免過高風險、要求上市企業必須報告CEO與員工中位薪水的比例等。然而美國不但不應該推翻這些適度的薪酬改革，反而應該推行一些更大膽的方案，比如用稅收和政府項目分包等手段來獎勵那些CEO薪酬較為合理的企業。

雖然特朗普在競選期間也曾批評過CEO薪水過高的問題，但自從就任以來，面對他的共和黨同袍力主廢止奧馬巴CEO薪酬改革的洶洶之勢，特朗普卻并沒有給予哪怕一丁點的關注。

如果特朗普真的想“讓美國再次偉大”，他首先要做的事情之一，就是要讓企業高管的薪酬回歸到過去幾十年的那種較為合理的水平。在1980年，美國大型企業的負責人與普通工人的平均薪酬比大約為42比1，而如今這個比例已經飆升到了347比1。

這種極端的薪酬差距不僅顯失公平，對于企業的業務來說也是不利的。

企業文化

每年直接進入企業高管口袋里的那幾百萬美刀，對于美國企業的總成本來說自然不算什么，但對于員工士氣的影響卻是巨大的。如果你的老板的薪水比你高了347倍，你難免會產生“我在團隊里算什么”的卑微感。據2016年Glassdoor公司針對120萬人進行的一項調查顯示，CEO的薪酬越高，員工對老板的認可度一般就越低，二者之間呈現出強烈的相關性。

布魯金斯學會的一項研究也得出了類似的結論，研究發現，“地位的巨大差異”會抑制員工的參與度。《美國行政科學季刊》（Administrative Science Quarterly）上發表的一篇研究也認為，“工人與管理層之間的極端工資差距削弱了他們對企業的信任感，使他們無法將自己視為企業的利益相關者。”

股票回購

目前的薪酬體系也滋長了一種短期的投機心態，這不僅對個體企業有害，甚至對整體經濟都會產生負面影響。2008年的金融危機便是這種危險的“獎金文化”催生出的一個悲劇的特例。華爾街的高管們都死死地盯著獎金目標，因此采取了過于冒險的經營策略，這在短期內雖然讓他們大賺了一筆，但“紙牌屋”一旦坍塌，就會給經濟帶來災難性的損失。

CEO的高薪帶來的另一個問題，就是股票的回購狂潮。據馬薩諸塞州大學洛厄爾教授威廉?拉佐尼克計算，從2005年到2014年，美國的上市企業500強用于回購股票的資金就超過了3.7萬億，超過了這些企業凈收入的一半。CEO們之所以喜歡回購股票，就是因為他們的工資是與股價掛鉤的，所以他們要人為地推高股票的價值。然而這么多利潤都用于回購股票了，企業用于研發、員工培訓和其他長期發展用途的錢自然就少了。商學院管這種現象叫“吃玉米種子”，即寅吃卯糧。

據彭博社報道，去年美國企業薪資最高的CEO是沃爾瑪電商部門的負責人馬克?勞爾，達到了2.369億美元。作為全美雇傭工人最多的企業，如果沃爾瑪能給低收入的工人多付些工資，給高管們少付些工資，那么由此帶來的連帶效應也會對整體經濟更加有益。因為低收入家庭幾乎會把掙來的每一塊錢都花出去，這些錢最終又回到了流通領域，從而刺激了經濟。而像勞爾這樣的企業高管，當然是會把一大筆錢存起來，這筆錢對經濟產生不了任何貢獻。

最有希望整治CEO薪酬過高亂象的地方并不是華盛頓。去年12月，波特蘭市議會出臺了一項決定，對企業高管與普通工人的薪資比超過100倍的企業，在現有的2.2%的地方企業利潤稅的基礎上，還要再額外征收10%的附加稅。繼波特蘭之后，又有五個州的立法機關通過了類似的法案。

在一個理想的世界中，政府不需要強迫企業做一些本應該是常識的事情。但今天的一些商業領袖已經深陷貪欲，無法自拔了。對于這樣一個失去理性的CEO薪酬體系，是應該舉起改革的大刀闊斧，讓這些企業清醒清醒了。（財富中文網）

本文作者Steven Clifford是King Broadcasting公司的前任首席執行官，也是《CEO薪酬機器：對美國的破壞性以及如何遏止》（The CEO Pay Machine: How it Trashes America and How to Stop It）一書的作者。本文另一作者Sarah Anderson是全球經濟項目（Global Economy Project）負責人，也是美國政策研究學會官方博客Inequality.org的共同編輯。

譯者：樸成奎

The House is expected to vote Thursday on a Wall Street deregulation plan that would roll back several Obama-era CEO pay reforms, including a ban on banker bonuses that encourage excessive risk, and a new regulation that requires publicly held corporations to report the ratio between their CEO and median worker pay. But instead of rolling back modest pay reforms already on the books, lawmakers should be pushing for bolder solutions, such as using tax and government contracting policies that reward firms with reasonable CEO pay levels.

While President Donald Trump bashed high CEO pay on the campaign trail, since taking office, he hasn’t raised the slightest concern about his fellow Republicans’ crusade to repeal Obama-era executive compensation reforms.

If Trump truly wants to “make America great again,” one of his primary goals should be to restore CEO pay to the more rational levels of decades past. In 1980, the gap between average pay for the heads of large U.S. corporations and typical workers ran about 42 to 1. Today, this pay ratio stands at 347 to 1.

These extreme disparities are not only unfair, but they’re bad for business.

Company culture

The mega-millions that flow directly into executives’ pockets every year are just a small fraction of the total cost to American companies. But the effects on employee morale carry a much higher price. When the boss makes 347 times more than you, it’s difficult to swallow the canard that “there is no ‘I’ in team.” A 2016 Glassdoor survey of 1.2 million people bears this out statistically, finding a strong correlation between high CEO pay and low employee approval ratings for their bosses.

A Brookings Institution analysis reached a similar conclusion, finding that “large differences in status” within companies can inhibit participation. And in a study published in Administrative Science Quarterly, four researchers agreed that “extreme wage differentials between workers and management discourage trust and prevent employees from seeing themselves as stakeholders.”

Stock buybacks

The current compensation system also encourages a short-term mentality that is harmful not only for individual corporations, but for the whole economy. The 2008 financial crisis was just one particularly dramatic example of this dangerous “bonus culture.” Wall Street executives fixated on hitting bonus targets pursued excessively risky strategies that boosted the size of their paychecks in the short term but caused catastrophic economic damage when the house of cards came crashing down.

Another is the stock buyback craze. University of Massachusetts Lowell Professor William Lazonick has calculated that from 2005 to 2014, America’s 500 largest publicly traded corporations spent $3.7 trillion—over half their net income—repurchasing their own shares. CEOs love these buybacks because they artificially inflate the value of their stock-based pay. But by using up so much of their profits to buy back stock, corporations have less to spend on research and development, workforce training, and other long-term productive purposes. In business school, they call this “eating the seed corn.”

Last year’s largest executive pay package—at $236.9 million—went to Marc Lore, the CEO of Walmart’s e-commerce division, according to Bloomberg. If the nation’s largest employer instead paid their low-income workers more and top management less, the beneficial ripple effects would be much larger since low-income families need to spend nearly every dollar they make, whereas executives like Lore squirrel away a good share.

The strongest signs of hope of reining in runaway CEO pay are coming from outside of Washington. Last December, the city council in Portland, Ore. adopted a 10% surtax on top of its existing 2.2% local corporate profits tax on corporations with pay gaps of more than 100 to 1. Since then, legislators in five states have introduced similar bills.

In an ideal world, government wouldn’t need to push corporations to do something that should be common sense. But greed has rendered today’s business leaders unable to help themselves. Blunt policy instruments are needed to knock some sense into a CEO pay system gone mad.

Steven Clifford, the former CEO of King Broadcasting, is the author of The CEO Pay Machine: How it Trashes America and How to Stop It (Blue Rider Press). Sarah Anderson directs the Global Economy Project and co-edits Inequality.org at the Institute for Policy Studies.