Where to Find the Big Bucks?

I realize this isn't a sports forum, and this isn't really a sports question, but...

"But are there industries or segments that are overpaid?"

SPORTS!

American Major League Baseball: Average salary, $3,154,000 USD, 2005 season
Association Football: Average salary £1,200,000 2008 season
NHL Ice Hockey: Average salary $2,600,000 USD 2010-11 season

Lionel Messi is the world's highest paid footballer: £29,600,000 a year
Tiger Woods is the highest paid athlete of all: $127,902,706 USD, 2010 season

YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME! Money has absolutely ruined sports.

No wonder a plastic cup of flat beer costs $7.00 and a puffy hand is twenty bucks. I can't afford to go to games anymore.

There. Sports reference mode off, Doorman rant mode off.

You are not considering what those players are doing. What makes them worth the money they receive is based solely on the revenue that they return to their employers.

While I may agree that money alters the spirit of sports, you can always go to the little league or college games if that is what entertains you.

The Big Bucks is out in da forrest...

Probably chasing the little doe!!

Regards,
Sapper

You wrote, "Will manufacturing or engineering leaders ever earn the respect to take home bigger slices of the pie?"

I am sorry if I am harsh, but that is a foolish and myopic question.

Everyone gets paid for their value that they contribute based on what the market will bear and no more.

If you have an issue with what CEOs are being paid, before you lay out criticism for another you should walk in their shoes first.

That means you should become a CEO and then after you have successfully done that for a period of time, come back here and tell me if you are overpaid.

However, I suspect you have no grasp of what the job really entails and will be woefully unprepared for the task at hand. For that reason no one will ever hire you for that position, so you will always be sitting at the bar cluelessly complaining about the disparity of your salary.

Everyone gets paid for their value that they contribute based on what the market will bear and no more.

That means you should become a CEO and then after you have successfully done that for a period of time, come back here and tell me if you are overpaid.

Naive in the extreme.
Most top salaries are set by those receiving them or their colleagues at a similar pay level which is why they are so out of step with their value. You have remuneration committees of directors setting their own pay.
If you had a group of welders setting their own pay, I think their pay would increase somewhat too.
No one objects to high pay when it represents good value and is performance related, but at the moment many firms (especially investment banks) are rewarding failure.
many of these people earn more than they could possibly spend, it's simply obscene.
Del

You may not understand business very well. Board members can't be paid any more than what profits are generated (after paying salaries and stock holders if they exist). If they do you have a negative cash flow and therefore become a "government". ;-)

Unless the business is actually owned by the employees, the management sets the pay scales, not the other way around. The bases for what scales are used depends on the market and the level of expertise you want to recruit.

Even if employee owned, they still have to set pay levels based on profits or go unemployed when the business fails.

Although CEO's have great responsibillities their pay (and bonuses) should reflect the work they have done.

I don't see an engineer getting a bonus when his decisions caused a project to fail, BUT failing CEO'S still get (IMO) huge bonuses when they leave a company

Are you referring to "Occupy Wall Street" agitation?. If yes then I would say it is really shameful that CEOs who are pocketing millions of dollars, where as there is huge unemployment. It is just loot. About engineering profession it is pity that engineering is low paid profession, we have to slog, struggle, sweat even risk our lives just to earn meagre salary. It is thankless job. This is reason I did not allow my son to be engineer, he is in market research field.

You wrote, "...it is pity that engineering is low paid profession..."

Not in the USA. For the investment in education engineering gives one of the biggest bangs for the buck.

The average electrical engineer I makes $60,000 per year (0 to 2 years experience and a BSE degree). You can easily earn more with additional experience. Compare that with the average general physician's salary of $125,000 per year and that does not include the cost of medical malpractice insurance.

Hi Hero,

I am not comparing earnings of engineers in India. If you compare engineer's salary with an MBA, engineer is low paid employee. There are other professions where salaries are much hire than engineer's salary. Moreover engineers rarely reach top position in organisation it is taken by financial man.

Engineers and other useful folk will always be under paid.

If they were paid their true worth then there would be nothing left for the glitterati to plunder

Technical workers are the defacto slaves of the dumb masses.

The next time your CEOtype next door neighbour asks you a for a technical "favour" ask him to clean your bathroom.... and then expect to have to clean it again yourself while he surfs the internet for entertainment on the PC you just fixed (plugged in) for him.

Long sigh.

Yes and when you are 40 years old they will kick your ass out the door and hire a kid just out of school for half of what you currently were making. Salaries are currently depressed because employers are able to hire low wage engineers from third world places such as India. You can thank your legislator for that situation. I would not advise any young person to go into engineering, you can likely make as much money in a licensed trade with half the grief and bullshit that you will go through working in private Industry where the average CEO has the intelligence of a gnat.