Private-sector golden handshakes excessive

 

By James Winter 

 

The Windsor Star Windsor, Ont.: May 26, 2008. pg. A.6

 

The recent hullabaloo over our local university president’s salary and upcoming administrative leave provides an interesting look at how the media define news.

The bigger story here is the way public sector salaries are reported on, compared to the vastly inflated ones in the private sector.

The story actually begins with front page headlines on March 8, when it was revealed that 62 city police in Windsor, Ont., earned more than $100,000 in 2007. Star columnist Gord Henderson described the police service as "a bloated, arrogant, fat-cat organization where six-figure salaries (just a fantasy for us peons) are commonplace."

Thus began a feeding frenzy in the media, with details of extravagant salaries on front pages and in newscasts. Hospital administrators, municipal employees and local psychiatrists had their salaries laid bare. At my employer, the University of Windsor, 299 employees earned more than $100,000, so The Windsor Star focused on the five who exceeded $200,000, including president Ross Paul.

For comparison, The Star reminded readers of the plight of the average family. We were told that only 1.5 percent of Canadians earn more than $100,000, and that the "average two-income Canadian family earned $56,000 in 2005." All of this added fuel to the fire, and soon the letters page was ablaze with indignation, while the columnists fanned the flames.

When, in April, it was unearthed that Dr. Paul would receive a paid administrative leave for two years, before returning to teach, even the tolerant could no longer restrain themselves. Henderson wrote in the Star that, "Windsor’s ‘ivory tower’ is constructed, at least in part, out of pure gold, held together by sheer brass and an endless supply of taxpayer nickels."

In the midst of this flurry of reportage and commentary, there was a small note on page six of The Star’s business section, that Frank Stronach of Magna International made $40.3-million in 2007, or about $40 million more than Dr. Paul. Two days earlier the Toronto Star reported Stronach’s total compensation for 2007 at $70.6- million, smashing his own Canadian record of $58-million, from 2002.

Stronach’s earnings were 215 times Dr. Paul’s salary. A Toronto Star report appeared to justify Stronach’s income. A sub-headline read: "Founder of autoparts giant deserving of reward, company says," and Stronach was described in the story as the "flamboyant, hard-driving chair of the Aurora-based auto-parts powerhouse."

About a month later, Stronach was in the news again, lambasting Canadian workers for their high wage demands. "The unions have to change. Because otherwise there won’t be an industry. It’s as simple as that," Stronach said. By this time, reporters had forgotten his own extravagant income, and neglected to mention Stronach’s double standard.

Why would reporters champion workers against a university president, but ignore a wealthy industrialist who makes $70-million a year, while attacking "greedy" workers?

Dr. Paul is an academic who will be expected to conduct research and publish during his two-year leave, after stepping down as university president, not unlike normal sabbatical leaves for academics. Is the $305,000 he will receive as salary out-of-line?

Well, let’s compare that with some of the golden parachutes handed out with no expectations to corporate CEOs recently. Tony Comper of the Bank of Montreal took home $13.5-million in 2006, then retired in 2007 with unexercised stock options worth $53.2-million, plus a further $25.4-million worth of shares, for a total of $79-million.

South of the border, scandals have erupted when executives leave with huge pay packages after years of delivering poor performance. At Home Depot Inc., former CEO Robert Nardelli was paid $225-million during his six-year tenure while the stock fell 7.9 per cent. He left with a $210-million separation package.

The top 100 Canadian CEOs took less than a day and a half last year to earn the average yearly income for working Canadians. The CEOs average income was more than $8.5 million. In fact, the best-paid 100 CEOs earn more in a single year than all the residents of many small and medium-sized cities in Canada, according to research by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.

Public salary disclosures were legislated by the Mike Harris Conservative government in Ontario, in 1996. Since that time, they’ve been used as a cudgel with which to beat public officials. But while media attention is focused on this salary circus, the main event in the big boys’ tent is either ignored or rationalized.

The corporate-owned media claim to be merely watching out for taxpayers’ dollars. But what about shareholders’ dollars? Scandals such as Enron and the sub-prime mortgage fiasco prove that citizens need and lack media watchdogs over private industry.

In reality, for private media, public institutions and bodies ranging from schools or universities to public media such as the CBC, represent a threat. Anything which is publicly-owned is beyond the grasp of private enterprise, and is to be denigrated in any way possible.

The media have adopted with relish, the neoliberal maxim of small government, big business, and privatization.

James Winter is a professor at the University of Windsor, and the author of several books on the news media, including Lies The Media Tell Us, Black Rose Books, Montreal, 2007.

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