You might not think that one additional figure in the thick of annual financial reports would be a serious threat to our major corporations, but you’d be underestimating big business lobbyists’ penchant for hysteria. A simple rule finally passed by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) last week drew more than a quarter million comments and 1,500 letters to the commission – add a large stack of articles and op-eds, and one can imagine quite a number of people with steam shooting out of their ears.
In a 3-2 vote August 5, the SEC adopted a new rule requiring that companies disclose a comparison of CEO pay with worker pay. This disclosure rule was a mandate of the Dodd-Frank Act, the 2010 legislation passed in the wake of the recession, and will take effect in 2017. Labor groups and others concerned with economic inequality had pushed hard for the SEC to move forward on it.
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