Feb 23, 2007 4:22 pm US/Central
Legislator Wants To Curb TXU Execs' Salaries
by Bennett Cunningham
(CBS 11 News)
A North Texas lawmaker wants to pull the plug on cushy CEO salaries. A bill, that will be filed on Monday, may force TXU to either bring its rates in line with the national average, or the top executives will pay a fine equal to their big
seven figure salaries.
Fort Worth House Representative Lon Burnam will introduce the bill. He says one of the aims of the legislation will be to wrangle in TXU CEO C. John Wilder's salary. Burnam says, "this bill is targeted at him and his arrogance."
According to TXU's own documents, in the last two years available for government reporting, executives made a total of nearly $100 million. That's nearly
four times the amount of similar energy companies over the same time period.
Mr. Wilder earned nearly $60 million over those same two years. Burnam says he hopes the bill will, "...give us the opportunity to talk about the excessive greed by this CEO."
In essence, the bill works by targeting TXU and capping its executive salaries at the minimum wage, currently $5.15 per hour, but only if TXU's electric residential rates exceed 125% of the national average. Currently, the national average is about 10.5 cents per kilowatt hour and TXU's rates are as high as 15 cents.
Governor Rick Perry feels government shouldn't be regulating corporate salaries. "To tell people what they need to be paying corporate executives is a little bit over the top from my perspective."
TXU sent CBS 11 News a statement that said in part, "We don't believe government should intervene in this issue. Compensation for TXU Corp. executives is closely linked to the company's overall performance and should be governed by the competitive marketplace."
If the bill passes, any fine is based on the compensation of the executive. That money would go into a state fund for low income families in need of electric assistance.
(© MMVII, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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