In the past several months, Switzerland has made some interesting compensation headlines. Swiss voters recently passed a referendum on executive compensation that is more far-reaching and restrictive than anything we currently have in the U.S. This new set of rules was supported by a convincing 68% of voters. At nearly the same time, a UBS report from September 2012 shows that Swiss employees in Geneva and Zurich receive the highest net wages in the world. Does this tell us anything?
The highest paid employees in the world just voted for some of the most restrictive executive compensation reform we have seen to date. To be fair, Geneva and Zurich are among the most expensive cities in the world, but UBS reports they also have some of the lowest tax rates. I think it is telling when people who are doing relatively well compared to the rest of the world still have an issue with how much executives are making. I am just not sure what it is really telling us.
Are executives paid too much? Is there a misunderstanding of how and why executive pay came to be at its current levels? Has the media, or have politicians, flamed the fires of executive compensation unrest? Or are executives in some sort of compensation cold war, outspending each other to show their relevance and power? Let’s be honest, all of the above are far too simplistic, but each is believed by groups of employees, shareholders or others.
The new Swiss limitations on executives apply to publicly traded companies. Among the new rules is a requirement that pension funds vote in the interest of their members. They must also report how they voted. There are also annual say on pay votes, annual elections for directors and a ban on severance and golden parachute payments. Companies’ Articles of Association (similar to U.S. Articles of Incorporation) must add new details on compensation structure and rules for how compensation may be used for several groups and purposes. The final kicker is the potential for criminal penalties and fines if these rules are broken.
These new rules may simply be a shot across the bow in the new battle to bring executive compensation levels into publicly acceptable ranges. Several other countries, including the U.S. and a few Western European countries, have incomplete rules on the books or in the works. Executives may find themselves boxed in by the many stakeholder and influencers with different perspectives on this issue.
A decade ago when the UK rolled out its Say on Pay rules, few consultants or companies believed that similar restrictions were likely to occur in the US. They were right for almost ten years. While we will not see aggressive new restrictions on executive pay in the immediate future, the approval and gradual acceptance of these rules across the Atlantic may be writing our future. In the past, rules like this have taken 5-10 year to reach our shores, but we all know that cycles are speeding up. We may well see restrictions like this sooner than expected. Are you ready, and will you support or oppose these efforts?