Taxpayers Pad Military Contractor CEO Pockets
[font size="1"]Warmonger by John Carroll.[/font size]
Military contractors among the highest-paid CEOs of the past two decades.
by Javier Rojo
Published on Tuesday, September 3, 2013 by Foreign Policy In Focus
Would you believe me if I told you that your tax dollars are lining the pockets of some of the highest-paid CEOs?
The Institute for Policy Studies recently released a report examining the performance of the corporate chief executives who have ranked among America’s 25 highest-paid CEOs in one or more of the past 20 years. CEOs from leading government contractors comprise more than 12 percent of the top-paid chief executives in the Institute’s report. In the same years that these CEOs received some of corporate America’s fattest paychecks, their firms snagged $255 billion in taxpayer-funded federal contracts.
Five of the companies with the highest-paid CEOs made the top 100 U.S. government contractors list every year over the past 20 years. These firms include two big military contractors — Lockheed Martin and United Technologies — along with IBM, General Electric, and Honeywell. These five companies have received $671 billion in federal contracts over the past 20 years.
More taxpayer dollars have flowed into the coffers of aerospace giant Lockheed Martin than any other U.S. corporation over the past 20 years. In 2012, U.S. government contracts accounted for 82 percent of Lockheed’s net sales.
A massive chunk of these public funds has wound up in the pockets of the company’s executives. Five times over the past 20 years Lockheed CEOs ranked among America’s top 25 highest-paid chief executives, earning sums that dwarf the pay levels of any U.S. military general or, for that matter, the commander in chief.
These taxpayer dollars haven’t inspired superior CEO performance. Lockheed Martin stands responsible for one of the most wasteful military projects of all time, the F-22 Raptor. At a cost of $339 million each, this plane became the most expensive fighter jet ever built— and never saw action in actual fighting.
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http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/09/03-1
PS: Think about this when you wonder why We the People live like serfs and the Grandees at the top of the food chain live better than Xerxes could ever have dreamed.