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Fallout: The Financial Crisis

Gov’t to vet exec pay at bailed-out firms

Alisa Roth Aug 13, 2009
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Fallout: The Financial Crisis

Gov’t to vet exec pay at bailed-out firms

Alisa Roth Aug 13, 2009
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TEXT OF STORY

Bill Radke: It’s going to be a busy couple of months for Kenneth Feinberg. He’s the guy who’ll vet executive pay at companies that’ve taken government bailout money. Today’s the deadline for those companies to submit executive pay packages. And as Marketplace’s Alisa Roth tells us, Feinberg’s decisions could change the rules at those companies. And others.


Alisa Roth: The government will have to approve pay packages for the big cheeses at Citigroup, Bank of America and GM, among others. Mark Borges is a compensation consultant at Compensia. He says he expects some negotiation on the proposed packages.

Mark Borges: We’ll see the government attempt to exert some influence at least directionally in the programs, but I don’t think that the government is going to want to dictate all of the details.

But the administration would like these decisions to be a guide on executive pay for other firms. Andrew Oringer works on pay issues at the law firm Ropes and Gray. He says companies know people are upset about executive pay. At the same time, he says…

ANDREW ORINGER: I don’t think that there is some kind of abject capitulation to the notion that we are no longer in a position to pay our executives appropriately and competitively.

He says companies still want to be able to set their own standards and pay. No matter what the government says.

In New York, I’m Alisa Roth for Marketplace.

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