Obama's Pay Czar Meets With Bailed-Out Firms

Feinberg beefs up base base to help firms retain talent

(NEWSER) - Base pay will increase for the majority of top execs in the finance and auto firms supervised by federal pay czar Kenneth Feinberg. Salaries are being bumped up—by hundreds of thousands of dollars in some cases—as bonuses and other perks are slashed. Despite the salary hikes, all 136 execs at the seven firms overseen by Feinberg will end up making much less than last year. More»

175 top earners will see pay cuts averaging 50%

(NEWSER) - President Obama’s pay czar will cut compensation for the 25 highest-paid employees at seven companies that took large amounts of government aid. The 175 executives will face salary reductions of 90%, but with other compensation elements added in, the total reductions average 50%. Ken Feinberg also will require the seven bailed-out firms to change the way they do business in an effort to discourage excessive short-term risk-taking. More»

(NEWSER) - Just because top banking executives took home hefty paychecks in recent months doesn't mean they'll get to keep the money, reports Reuters. White House pay czar Kenneth Feinberg declared he has clear authority to "claw back" egregious bonuses already paid out by any bank that received federal TARP money. More»

Compensation limits have prompted swift TARP repayment

(NEWSER) - A common complaint about the TARP bailouts was that by injecting capital and making the financial environment more friendly, the government wasn't doing enough to push the banks into real reform. Why wouldn't the banks simply live off TARP cash as long as they could? Yet those concerns were unfounded, writes Daniel Gross, because it turned out the government did have an effective motivator: limits on compensation. More»

Warren confirms cuts to 25 top earners at 7 companies

(AP) - The Treasury Department today is expected to order seven companies that have not paid back last year's US government bailouts to halve their top executives' average compensation. The cuts apply to the 25 highest-paid executives at banks and other companies that received the most assistance, with salaries being slashed by as much as 90%. The move, reported last night, is "real," TARP overseer Elizabeth Warren confirmed to CBS this morning. More»