It isn't so much the staggering amounts of money that CEO's of American companies make that surprises me, it's the fact that they expect the companies to pay for every last cent of their living expenses. News today that private-equity giant Blackstone Group paid Chief Executive Stephen Schwarzman $400 million in 2006 -- almost double the combined compensation for the CEO's of Wall Street's five biggest investment banks, is bad enough. But the fact that Co-founder and Chief Operating Officer Peter Peterson, aged 80, will get $1.88 billion from the upcoming IPO of Blackstone, and retain a 4 percent stake valued at about $1.3 billion , as well as having earned $212.9 million in compensation last year tends to make ones jaw drop in amazement. But here's the best bit... Schwarzman and Peterson jointly own a helicopter, for which Blackstone paid them $158,500 in hourly rates for business use last year. And Schwarzman was paid $1.54 million in hourly fees for use of the airplane he owns. So, after pulling down nearly a billion dollars a year between them, these two bozos expect the company to reimburse them for the use of their own planes, which I am sure the company bought them in the first place. I have a question for 80 year old Mr Peterson... How many of these billions do you expect to take with you when you climb aboard for that final helicopter ride?
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Move over, there's enough here for all of us in management!
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