Corporations and business groups have lobbied hard against it. They've said it takes a lot of work to calculate. The proposed rule requires them to compare the CEO's pay to the median of all employees, whether they are full-time, part-time, temporary or foreign-based.
The SEC tried to simplify things by allowing companies some freedom in how they arrive at the median worker's pay. They could use a statistical sample, for instance, as the SEC has not prescribed a methodology for calculating the ratio. But companies have taken issue with this, too, according to Steve Seelig, a senior regulatory adviser at the consulting firm Towers Watson.
Seelig said they're frustrated with the idea that the news media and activist investors might try to compare the ratios across companies, even though the underlying method for reaching the figures might not be the same. Still, he said, "I think most companies are resigned that they're going to have to make this disclosure."
While the complaints often focus on the mechanics of the rule, companies probably don't relish the idea of these numbers being published at all. One look at a study from Bloomberg, which calculated the ratios itself, shows why: The study's most eye-popping CEO-to-worker pay ratio was 1,795 to 1, and 28 of the companies it examined had pay ratios of more than 500 to 1.
Bloomberg, it should be noted, used government data to substitute industry-specific averages for worker pay, since companies don't often publicly share those numbers. Yet even if the actual ratios are somewhat lower when specific company numbers are used, most likely they will still be high enough to ruffle feathers.
In a comment letter to the SEC in December, the president of the Center on Executive Compensation, a business trade group, wrote that "the pay ratio requirement itself is mistaken: it will provide no useful information to investors and to the extent the information is used by investors at all, it is likely to be misleading and thus will be harmful to them."
On Friday, the same group submitted another letter urging the SEC to amend the proposed rule, outlining changes it said would significantly save companies money in calculating the figure.
There still isn't an active rule. On September 19, a year after the initial rule was proposed, the nonprofit organisations Americans for Financial Reform and Public Citizen issued a statement urging the SEC to finalise it. The SEC has not announced a timetable on the rule, but SEC Chairman Mary Jo White has testified that completing the rulemaking required by the Dodd-Frank Act is one of her priorities. She said it is her "hope and expectation" to complete it by the end of the year.
It's hard to tell yet what impact publicly sharing the ratio will have. CEO pay hasn't exactly gone down since companies began having to disclose more details about executive compensation in 2006.
"The overarching question on this is, is the behaviour going to change when this disclosure hits the streets?" Seelig said. "Are companies going to do something different?"
Even if the disclosure doesn't immediately drive down pay, some investor groups and activists think it will have an effect. Because data isn't available to investors, some groups say the disclosure will help them make more-informed decisions about a company's human resources practices, as well as help reduce pay levels over time.
"This rule is not a cure-all or a magic bullet," said Lisa Donner, executive director of Americans for Financial Reform. "It's relevant information for investors about how a company works. This disclosure is one piece of the puzzle, but it's useful to have public and standard - or relatively standard - information."
Harvard Business School professor Michael Norton, one of the researchers behind the study, noted that while revealing CEO pay ratios could lead to a reduction in executive pay, it could also demotivate workers.
"One reason often given for why very high salaries for CEOs are sensible is that higher salaries motivate people to work harder," he said in an email. "But research shows that when pay inequality is suddenly made public, lower paid workers report less job satisfaction, but higher paid workers do not experience any benefit."
It is unclear whether the rule could have long-term effects on reducing the pay gap, or just hit CEOs with some short-term shame. But it's a safe bet that when the rule finally does come out, Americans - and particularly the investing public - are likely to be more aware of how much the boss actually makes.
- Washington Post
