Cincinnati, Ohio-Based Ethically-Challenged Fifth Third Bancorp's Top-Tier Executives Average Annual Pay and Employee Benefits Increase Was a Blistering 18.0% Per Year During the Past Ten Years. There Appears to be Some Grade Inflation Going On Here in the Evaluation of Top-Tier Executives.

The third Democratic 2020 Presidential candidate debate was held in Houston, Texas on September 12, 2019.  The stickout strong performers in this debate were Amy Klobuchar, Pete Buttigieg, Beto O'Rourke and Cory Booker.  The only one of the Top Four candidates in the polls performing OK in this debate was Elizabeth Warren, with the other Top Three in the polls slipping in performance in this debate, especially two of them Kamala Harris and Bernie Sanders.

The most insightful recent move by the Democratic Presidential candidates is Pete Buttigieg's Bus, which is being driven now all over Iowa.  With this acquisition, Pete is showing his confidence in very effectively dealing with the press on a constant basis.  This move should eventually propel him into 3rd place in Iowa behind Elizabeth Warren and Joe Biden and give Pete a decent shot of eventually reaching the coveted 15% of Iowa's caucus vote.

The fourth Democratic 2020 Presidential candidate debate will be held on October 15, 2020 at Otterbein University in Westerville, Ohio, a Columbus suburb.  It's good to see that the New York Times will be one of the hosts.  The quality and relevance of the questions should improve substantially from what they were in the first three debates where the key economic issues played such a minor part.

The key issue to Ohio citizens should be the huge and continuing Income Inequality Expansion which is at the core of many critical problems the US faces.

While increasing the US federal minimum wage will help here, there is a much broader and critical problem that needs to be solved.  The annual percentage increase in the pay and employee benefits of Company non-executive employees are minuscule in relation to that of Company executive employees and this has been going on for decades.  When Corporate CEOs and CFOs primarily view non-executive employees as Costs rather than as People, this is what happens. And neither political party has had the courage to take on US Corporations here.

Thus I will be doing research and making posts on the average annual pay and employee benefits increase per year that the Top-Tier Executives of large Ohio Companies were rewarded with in the past ten years.

The 23rd Ohio Company I am addressing here is Fifth Third Bancorp.

From annual compensation information contained in Company Proxy Statement filings with the US SEC, the chart at the bottom below shows Fifth Third Bancorp's Top-Tier Executives Annual Total Compensation for each of the two consecutive full years of employment for the past ten years.
  
Fifth Third Bancorp's Top-Tier Executives Average Annual Pay and Employee Benefits Increase was a blistering 18.0% per year during the past ten years, which is the 12th highest of the 23 large Ohio-related Companies I have addressed so far.

1. TransDigm Group +243.1% per year for the past ten years
2. Worldpay +49.0% per year for the past seven years
3. General Motors +29.5% per year for the past ten years
4. Welltower +24.0% per year for the past ten years
5. Timken Company +23.3% per year for the past ten years
6. MPLX LP +22.4% per year for the past five years
7. RPM International +21.8% per year for the past ten years
8. Scotts Miracle-Gro +21.5% per year for the past ten years
9. Cintas Corp +20.7% per year for the past ten years
10. Andeavor Logistics LP +20.6% per year for the past seven years
11. Marathon Petroleum Corp +18.7% per year for the past ten years
12. Fifth Third Bancorp +18.0% per year for the past ten years
13. Nordson Corp +15.3% per year for the past ten years
14. American Electric Power +14.5% per year for the past ten years
15. Eaton Corp plc +12.7% per year for the past ten years
16. Progressive Corp +12.1% per year for the past ten years
17. Sherwin-Williams +12.0% per year for the past ten years
18. Parker-Hannifin +12.0% per year for the past ten years
19. FirstEnergy +10.2% per year for the past ten years
20. J. M. Smucker +8.8% per year for the past ten years
21. Lancaster Colony +8.0% per year for the pat ten years
22. Lincoln Electric Holdings +7.6% per year for the past ten years
23. Procter & Gamble +7.4% per year for the past ten years

There have been many US Government laws enacted in the past two decades that have substantially increased income inequality expansion, but none more so than the Trump Tax Cuts Act.

On the other hand, the only highly effective US Government law enacted by either party in the past two decades that has substantially reduced income inequality expansion is Obamacare.

My objective is to get a better handle on just why the US and particularly here Ohio has such massive continuing Income Inequality Expansion ..... it appears to be predominantly about the relative long-term annual pay raise percentages for the executives of a Company vs the many non-executive employees of a Company, coupled with the stock price appreciation subsequent to the time the company executives were rewarded in their pay with stock equity compensation.

To fix Income Inequality driven mainly by Company and its Board of Director choices on Percentage Annual Pay Raises, the US Government should step in and pass wisely-designed, simple but effective Fair Pay Raise Income Inequality Narrowing Company tax incentives for Companies which reward non-executive employees with fair pay increases ..... the carrot ..... and Company tax disincentives for Companies which reward executive employees with clearly excessively high pay increases ..... the stick.  I am certain ..... it is simple math ..... that this tax proposal would be very effective in substantially reducing the huge income inequality expansion that has occurred for decades in annual percentage pay raises between company executives and the rest of the company employees.

The above Fair Pay Raise Tax proposal could also be applied to US Non-Profit Organizations like Hospitals and other Health Care Organizations, which are known for their huge and continuing income inequality expansion due to their discriminating policies on annual pay and employee benefit increases.  

And the continuing annual net tax revenues raised by the US Government here should be set up in a separate fund to be used only for wise additional income inequality narrowing initiatives.  This fund should be run by an outside group made up entirely of minorities harmed the most by Income Inequality Expansion of the past decades  .....all women, all blacks, all Latinos, all other non-white people, all past and present union members, all LGBTQ, all non-employee contract workers and all middle and lower income people of all ages, including those retired.

Also, the US Government should require all US Corporate Boards to include at least one worker representative and to exclude any Company Executive.

Further, the US Government should ban Golden Parachutes.

	FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE
	Dec	Dec		Dec	Dec		Dec	Dec		Dec	Dec		Dec	Dec
Fifth Third Bancorp	2018	2017		2017	2016		2016	2015		2015	2014		2014	2013
Top-Tier	Total	Total		Total	Total		Total	Total		Total	Total		Total	Total
Executive	Comp	Comp		Comp	Comp		Comp	Comp		Comp	Comp		Comp	Comp
	$ 000s	$ 000s		$ 000s	$ 000s		$ 000s	$ 000s		$ 000s	$ 000s		$ 000s	$ 000s
Greg Carmichael Chairman and CEO	11,174	8,688		8,688	7,555		7,555	6,451		6,451	3,913		3,913	4,373
Tayfun Tuzun CFP	3,022	2,713		2,713	2,547		2,547	2,158		2,158	1,656		1,656	925
Lars Anderson COO	3,898	3,276		3,276	3,498		N/A	N/A
Spence Head ConsumerBank&Payments	3,039	3,096		3,096	2,815		N/A	N/A
Frank Forrest Chief Risk Officer	2,895	2,683		2,683	2,562		2,562	2,788		2,788	1,950		N/A	N/A
Kevin Kabat Vice Chair and Retired CEO										7,975	7,427		7,427	8,165
Poston Former Chief Admin Officer										N/A	N/A		2,401	2,724
Robert Sullivan EVP													1,988	2,138
Totals	24,028	20,456		20,456	18,977		12,664	11,397		19,372	14,946		17,385	18,325
Annual % Change vs Prior Year	17.5%			7.8%			11.1%			29.6%			-5.1%
5 Year Average Per Year % Change		12.2%
	FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE
	Dec	Dec		Dec	Dec		Dec	Dec		Dec	Dec		Dec	Dec
Fifth Third Bancorp	2013	2012		2012	2011		2011	2010		2010	2009		2009	2008
Top-Tier	Total	Total		Total	Total		Total	Total		Total	Total		Total	Total
Executive	Comp	Comp		Comp	Comp		Comp	Comp		Comp	Comp		Comp	Comp
	$ 000s	$ 000s		$ 000s	$ 000s		$ 000s	$ 000s		$ 000s	$ 000s		$ 000s	$ 000s
Greg Carmichael Chairman and CEO	4,373	5,017		5,017	3,716		3,716	2,462		2,462	2,148		2,148	1,399
Tayfun Tuzun CFP	925	782		782	444
Kevin Kabat Vice Chair and Retired CEO	8,165	8,987		8,987	7,238		7,238	4,822		4,822	5,216		5,216	3,336
Poston Former Chief Admin Officer	2,724	3,065		3,065	2,178		2,178	1,433		1,433	938		938	611
Robert Sullivan EVP	2,138	2,595		2,595	2,725		2,722	1,542		1,542	1,618		1,618	1,354
Paul Reynolds Former Chief Risk Officer	N/A	N/A		2,829	2,224		2,227	1,574
Totals	18,325	20,446		23,275	18,525		18,081	11,833		10,259	9,920		9,920	6,700
Annual % Change vs Prior Year	-10.4%			25.6%			52.8%			3.4%			48.1%
5 Year Average Per Year % Change		23.9%
10 Year Average Per Year % Change		18.0%