Readers React: Workers work, CEOS get paid

David Lazarus’ framing of the CEO-worker pay gap allows us to see clearly an egregious error in thinking: How exactly does the chief executive demonstrate his worth? (“Executive pay is an insult to working families,” Column, May 26)

A CEO is often credited with any rise in profit, but profit is often the result of cutting wages and employees rather than any improvements. When the anticipated outcome of such a strategy is a CEO pay raise, a clear conflict of interest arises.

As for the CEO of CVS Caremark, who as Lazarus notes earns 422 times what his median employee makes, where would CVS be without those who drive the trucks? How about those who stock the shelves? Sweep the floors? How long would CVS survive without them?

As Lazarus points out, it is an insult to working people to have their labor negated by this disparity. Between now and Labor Day, every CEO in America should ask himself exactly how he could do what he does without the thousands of workers beneath him.

Patricia Allen

Ojai