Ron gets a puritanical no-prize for bringing us a typical rant against the "outrageousness" of CEO compensation in the corporate world today. While warning shareholders that the boss may be playing fast and loose with one's money is in general a good thing, further reading of Mr. Brush's other articles indicates to me his motives come more from envy than anything else.

The bottom line is, if the CEO is steering the ship well, with profits rising and costs declining, why not give him or her nice things? The costs of what a bad, albeit cheaper, CEO would do to a large company's bottom line will most certainly exceed the costs of keeping a good one.

Fussing about a $6,000 wine allowance is a good idea when a company, no matter what its size, is struggling. Doing so when that company just increased profits by 30% and raked in billions of dollars in profits for its shareholders, well, that's just clucking to me.