NYC salary transparency law likely to remain unchanged; additional guidance provided

The New York City pay transparency law requires that NYC employers with four or more employees include the salary range of the position in job postings. In March, new legislation was introduced in the New York City Council to amend the law. This bill, if passed, would amend the law in a few critical aspects. Among other things, the amendment would (i) push the effective date of the law from May 15, 2022 to November 1, 2022; (ii) exclude employers with fewer than 15 employees; (iii) change references to the term “salary” to read “hourly or salary compensation”; and (iv) amend the law so that it would not apply to general notices without reference to particular positions and to positions that are not required to be performed at least in part in NYC. READ MORE

Negotiating Favorable Executive Equity Terms in an LLC – Capital vs. Profit Interests

Despite the pandemic, executive recruiters face one of the strongest candidate markets in the past twenty years. You have more negotiating power than ever for executive compensation. 

When it comes to executive equity compensation, do you know that there are differences between employee equity from a corporation and an LLC? This article explains two types of employee equity you can receive from an LLC, how they compare to equity in corporations, and what favorable terms to negotiate for your executive equity compensation package. READ MORE

Comment Periods Close Again for Proposed Clawback and Pay-for-Performance Rules

Two Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) executive compensation rules on recoupment of incentive compensation in the event of a financial restatement (clawbacks) and the correlation between executive pay and company performance (pay-for-performance), which were originally proposed in 2015 but never adopted, were reopened for public comment on October 14, 2021 and January 27, 2022, respectively. The proposed rules on clawbacks and pay-for-performance were intended to fulfill rulemaking requirements mandated by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 (the Dodd-Frank Act). In reopening the comment periods on these rules, the SEC also requested input on certain possible expansions to the original proposals in view of the time elapsed and developments in executive compensation since the original proposals. READ MORE

Elon Musk scores hat trick of Tesla compensation goals worth $23 billion

With Tesla's strong quarterly report on Wednesday, Chief Executive Elon Musk has scored a hat trick of performance goals worth a combined $23 billion in new compensation.

The world's most valuable carmaker posted March quarter revenue and profit that surged past Wall Street estimates as it raised prices in response to inflation, offsetting the impact of a Shanghai factory shutdown. READ MORE

Apple retail union organizers want workers to be paid at least $30 per hour

Workers who hope to organize a union at Apple’s Grand Central Terminal store want workers to be paid a minimum of $30 per hour, according to a website for the group, Fruit Stand Workers United, that was updated on Monday.

Employees at Apple’s high-profile store in New York City started to take steps to unionize earlier this year, posting the first public-facing website announcing their effort over the weekend. READ MORE

Want To Exercise Your Stock Options? Read This First.

Equity remains one of the hallmarks of working at a startup. But while it’s something most employees receive, it’s not something that all take advantage of.

Factors abound when considering if and when to exercise your stock options. In the spirit of tax season and a pent-up IPO pipeline, we talked to some equity experts about what employees should keep in mind when making decisions around their equity. READ MORE

Elon Musk would eliminate salaries for Twitter's board if buyout succeeds

Billionaire Elon Musk would cut the salaries of Twitter's board of directors to zero if his ongoing attempt to purchase the company succeeds, Musk announced Monday.

Musk offered to purchase Twitter and take it private for $54.20 last week, and Twitter's board is working to fight off the buyout. Board members currently make between $200,000 and $300,000 salaries, equating to an annual cost of roughly $3 million for the company. READ MORE

An Ever-Widening Chasm: CEO Pay-to-Worker Pay Ratio

CEO pay has long been a controversial topic, as most companies award their top executives with multiple bonuses, stock options, and perks while barely giving raises to their average employee. Yearly increments often do not match inflation levels. While inflation has grown by nearly 8%, hourly wages have barely increased by 4.7%. CEO salary, however, has continued to maintain the security and comfort it offers.

In February, 85% of companies told Payscale that they are worried about inflation, but most also admitted that they aren’t giving pay increases to match it. One group that tends to be insulated from these economic changes is that of the CEOs. READ MORE

A Guide on Sales Compensation

Sales compensation is an important factor for the revenue growth of an organization and needs to be re-evaluated from time to time to ensure your top salespeople are motivated to drive organizational success.

Unfortunately, many organizations continue to use outdated programs or worse, compensation plans that are incompatible with their objectives. READ MORE

Sharing Accountability and Success: Why We're Linking Employee Compensation to ESG Goals

As a company, we are committed to doing well by doing good. It’s something that makes us unique. It’s core to our values and we expect it of ourselves. It shows up in many forms inside and outside of Mastercard. We see it in our In Solidarity commitment to narrow the racial wealth and opportunity gap and the Priceless Planet Coalition, which aims to plant 100 million trees by 2025. It’s also embodied in our innovations like True Name and the Touch Card. Regardless of the specific initiative or product, it means leading our business with empathy to help us build better solutions for everyone. READ MORE

Bayer CEO gets proxy brawlers' backing, but exec compensation still in investors' crosshairs

Beleaguered Bayer CEO Werner Baumann has clinched the support of two major investors, but shareholder concerns surrounding the German conglomerate’s C-suite payouts persist.

Prominent proxy brawlers Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) and Glass Lewis have endorsed Bayer’s leadership but stopped short of blessing its “excessive” executive compensation plans, Bloomberg News first reported. The investors' partial support comes after both outfits in 2019 agitated against Baumann's leadership, recommending a historic no-confidence vote against the CEO. READ MORE

Beyond Compensation And Benefits: Why Company Culture Is Key

One of the most interesting outcomes of the past two years is the renewed focus on company culture and the prioritization of work-life balance above compensation and benefits. A Glassdoor survey found that 77% of respondents consider a company’s culture before applying for a job there, and 56% said company culture is more important than salary as it relates to job satisfaction. And that was before the pandemic. In 2021, Glassdoor found that toxic work culture was one of the biggest factors in people quitting. READ MORE

Is Your Compensation Reasonable?

There are two universal principles regarding the reasonableness of employee compensation: (i) most people feel they are undercompensated and (ii) those same people feel their friends and neighbors are overcompensated. There are many reasons for this phenomenon, but for our unscientific purposes it’s enough to think of reasonableness like beauty – it’s in the eyes of the beholder. READ MORE

OFCCP Guidance on Privilege Assertions Over Pay Equity Audit Materials

Since President Biden took office in January 2021, employers’ compensation and nondiscrimination practices have been under increasing scrutiny by the federal government. For example, the recently issued Directive 2022-01—the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) of the United States Department of Labor’s first directive since President Biden took office—directly underscores that pay equity is a priority of the new administration. This Directive, among other mandates, makes clear that OFCCP intends to challenge whether employers can rely on the attorney-client privilege and work product doctrine to protect internal pay equity audits from being produced when requested by OFCCP as part of its investigations into regulatory compliance. As a result, companies should be particularly mindful of how they conduct internal pay equity analyses going forward. This is especially important considering OFCCP Director Jenny Yang has recently declared that going forward, it is “redoubling its efforts to remove barriers to pay equity.” READ MORE