Norman Wolfe on Why the Executive Compensation Debate is Fundamentally Flawed:

Yet in the current discussion on CEO pay we take as a given that CEOs are in it for the money and we have to pay them to get them and keep them. Yet these very same people would not take this position with their own organizations. Or if they do is this the kind of culture or tone at the top you want for your company.

From this perspective, the argument for high-CEO pay runs counter to a lot of wisdom about avoiding hiring people who are driven only by the salary. Unfortunately, the entire elite executive culture probably needs to change first before we start seeing reasonable executive salaries.