Get executive pay back on the road to sanity and decency

Richard Fuld, the CEO of Lehman Brothers, is paid $45-million a year. Let's be charitable and presume that he puts in 40 hours a week — his pay works out to be $21,634 an hour. In other words, it takes Fuld less than three hours to make what the average family earns in a year.

Isn't this the sort of inequality — and obscene riches — that set off revolutions in other countries over the centuries?

This week, Congress is tackling the gargantuan $700-billion proposal to bail out some of Fuld's fellow Wall Street CEOs who got in over their heads on risky mortgage investments. Some members of Congress have had the good sense to demand that cuts in CEO pay be part of any company's bailout deal. Stick to your guns, guys, and get executive compensation back on the road to sanity and decency.

No job is worth $21,634 an hour. See that for what it is: unchecked greed.

That $700-billion bailout represents $2,000 out of the pocket of every American. Just think: Fuld will have to toil six minutes, give or take a second or two, to come up with his share.