CEOs Live the Good Afterlife

Corporate critics who say there is not enough connection between performance and executive pay may be gravely concerned to learn that many execs will keep getting sky-high bonuses when they're 6 feet under. A Wall Street Journal review finds dozens of CEOs will receive "golden coffin" payments if they die in office, sometimes in excess of $100 million.

"We think the compensation has been grossly too high already," said a shareholder whose protests helped convince Comcast to nix plans to keep paying one exec $2 million for 5 years after his death. "There's no need to pay them more when they're dead." Counters an Occidental spokesman of its CEO's $101.9 million coffin: It "isn't a death benefit per se—it's what his family would get upon his death." (More CEO stories.)