San Francisco, California Retailer Williams-Sonoma Inc's Top-Tier Executives Average Annual Pay and Employee Benefits Increase Was a Blistering 35.5% Per Year During the Past Ten Years

I have researched and made posts related to Top-Tier Executive Total Compensation in most of the largest companies headquartered in the four earliest 2020 Democratic Primary States ..... Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina.

Also of the 14 Super Tuesday US States holding their 2020 Democratic Presidential Primaries on March 3, 2020, I made like posts related to most of the largest Texas Companies, most of the largest North Carolina Companies, most of the largest Minnesota Companies, most of the largest Massachusetts Companies, most of the largest Southern California companies and most of the largest technology companies headquartered in the San Francisco/Silicon Valley, California area.  Thus I now will complete California Companies by covering most of the largest Non-Technology Companies in the San Francisco/Silicon Valley, California area. 

My research has shown that Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders and Tom Steyer are all spot on when they assert that US Corporate Financial Corruption is rampant.  But the problem is that none of the three have any clue on precisely the cause or how to effectively fix this huge problem which is also the primary cause of the huge, continuing US income inequality expansion which has been occurring for decades.  They don't understand precisely the mechanics of how large US Corps have expanded income inequality so dramatically in each year for decades.  You can't fix something you don't sufficiently understand.  It's insufficient to just grouchily complain about it all of the time without offering effective solutions. 

There is only one Democratic Presidential candidate who has both the requisite financial acumen and economic fairness to turn the tide on this massive, continuing US income inequality expansion ..... Pete Buttigieg.  

Frankly, Joe Biden is devoid of financial acumen.  Biden is a very nice man, but he is so naive on economic issues that he isn't even aware of the extent of this continuing huge US income inequality expansion or precisely its cause which has been occurring under his nose for the past forty plus years.

Nor is Biden aware of, or else has decided to ignore, just how huge the largest US tax shelters are which are located right under his nose in his home State of Delaware, mostly in one Wilmington, Delaware building.  These Delaware tax shelters have substantially added to US income inequality each year.

Amy Klobuchar has very little financial acumen.  Similar to the way Republicans think, Amy successfully pushed strongly for tax breaks for the many Medical Companies in Minnesota but that has substantially expanded income inequality with no trickle down economic benefit to the middle and lower economic classes. 

Also on the very negative side, both Joe Biden and Amy Klobuchar voted for many years for the Annual Income Tax Loophole Extenders which dramatically increased US income inequality expansion each year.  On the positive side, voting for many years against these same Annual Income Tax Loophole Extenders were Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders.

If you want four more years of huge US income inequality expansion like we have had in the past forty years, then Joe Biden is your man.

I think Joe Biden would have a very difficult time beating Donald Trump.  With his advanced age, Biden has a very low energy level, whereas Trump, with his unbelievably high energy level, reminds me of the energizer bunny.  US citizens want an energetic US President.  

Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren are still both saddled with their pure Medicare For All position, which is highly unpopular to US voters at large.  If either of them won the 2020 Democratic Presidential Primary, they would stand little chance of beating Donald Trump in the 2020 Presidential general election.  Warren, with her consistently likable charismatic positive posture, would stand a much better chance of beating Trump than Bernie would, who comes across as a grumpy old white guy.

So far in my research of large US Corps I have shown that their Top-Tier Executives have been rewarded continually with just enormous annual percentage increases in pay and employee benefits, mostly stock equity compensation, to the extent that the key issue to US 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, this would be just a mere drop in the bucket as compared to the fact that 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 Corps here.

But this huge pay inequality problem also exists widely in the non-profit sector including in non-profit hospitals.  And it also exists widely in state and local governments, especially in public education.

So now I will be addressing Top-Tier Executive Compensation for five to ten years in some of the largest Non-Technology Companies in the San Francisco/Silicon Valley area of California.  

I will be doing this research mostly by stock market capitalization and thus the 30th Northern California Company that I am addressing here is Williams-Sonoma Inc.

From annual compensation information contained in Proxy Statement filings with the US SEC, the chart at the very bottom below shows Williams-Sonoma Inc's Top-Tier Executives Annual Total Compensation for each of the two consecutive full years of employment for the past ten years. 

Williams-Sonoma Inc's Top-Tier Executives Average Annual Pay and Employee Benefits Increase was a blistering 35.5% per year during the past ten years, which is the 6th highest of the 30 very large Northern California Non-Technology Companies I have addressed so far.

1. Tesla +153,474% per year for the past five years
2. Penumbra Inc +57.8% per year for the past four years
3. Lumentum Holdings Inc +51.6% per year for the past four years
4. Jazz Pharmaceuticals +37.5% per year for the past ten years
5. Align Technology +36.2% per year for the past five years
6. Williams-Sonoma +35.5% per year for the past ten years
7. The Gap Inc +28.7% per year for the past five years
8. Digital Realty Trust +28.4% per year for the past five years
9. Keysight Technologies +26.2% per year for the past five years
10. Prologis +25.1% per year for the past nine years 
11. BioMarin Pharmaceutical +23.1% per year for the past ten years
12. Cooper Companies +22.4% per year for the past ten years
13. Varian Medical Systems +21.9% per year for the past ten years
14. SVB Financial Group +21.2% per year for the past ten years
15. Ross Stores +20.8% per year for the past ten years
16. Essex Property Trust +19.5% per year for the past five years
17. Wells Fargo +19.3% per year for the past ten years
18. SYNNEX Corp +19.3% per year for the past five years
19. Levi Strauss & Co +18.9% per year for the past ten years
20. Equinix +18.6% per year for the past ten years
21. Bio-Rad Laboratories +17.8% per year for the past five years
22. First Republic Bank +17.8% per year for the past five years
23. Intuitive Surgical +16.0% per year for the past five years
24. Chevron +13.5% per year for the past ten years
25. Franklin Resources +12.6% per year for the past ten years
26. Agilent Technologies +12.0% per year for the past five years
27. Gilead Sciences +11.3% per year for the past five years
28. Clorox +11.2% per year for the past five years
29. Trimble Inc +10.4% per year for the past ten years
30. Charles Schwab Corp +8.5% per year for the past nine years

So who is causing these extremely high Top-Tier Executives annual pay percentages increases, which tend to be much higher than the Companies' actual annual financial performance?

And who is causing the annual minuscule raises for the company non-executive employees? 

Generally it works like this.

The Company's Board of Directors set the pay standards for the total compensation of the CEO for each year.   

  

Then the CEO establishes the pay standards for the Top-Tier Executives, which is reviewed by the Company's Board of Directors.  

And the CEO also usually approves the overall pay and employee benefits annual percentage increases for each of the other levels of the Company's employees.

So who is this huge, continuing Company pay and employee benefit income inequality "on"?

Clearly it's "on" the Company's CEO and the Company's Board of Directors.

It's simple math.  The lower the annual percentage raise for the Company's non-executive employees, the higher the Company's annual profits and thus also the higher the annual percentage raise for the Company's executives since their annual pay raise is tied to Company profits.

The end result is massive, continuing income inequality expansion.

And the only way it will be fixed is by wisely-designed US Government tax legislation, which gives companies very nice tax incentives for paying non-executive employees very well in a given year and which also requires companies to pay a luxury tax when executives are paid clearly too much in a given year or when non-executive employees are clearly paid too little in a given year.  In addition, it would be very helpful to dramatically increase the US Earned Income Tax Credit.

So, why hasn't it been fixed? 

Because more than half of the US Congress, including surprisingly more than a few Democrats, are effectively controlled by the US Corps or because the US President is controlled by the US Corps who are vigorously fighting to be at the top of the list of US Corps continuing to expand income inequality.

So how do you solve that problem?

Vote for US Senators, US House members and a US President who aren't controlled by the US Corps which view their non-executive employees and contract workers as Costs rather than as People ..... they all don't, but a clear majority of them do.

	FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE
Williams-Sonoma	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
Alber CEO	27,254	14,429		14,429	13,823		13,823	13,995		13,995	14,679		14,679	11,923
Whalen CFO	4,079	4,565		4,565	3,478		3,478	3,220		3,220	3,411		3,411	2,830
Bellos	4,250	4,044
Benson	4,671	2,955
Hayes	5,031	7,384		7,384	5,339		5,339	4,376		4,376	4,962		4,962	3,600
Brett Former Officer				N/A	N/A		6,676	6,362
Stangl Former Officer							4,829	5,828		5,828	6,576		6,576	5,338
Connolly													2,555	2,576
Totals	45,285	33,377		26,378	22,640		34,145	33,781		27,419	29,628		32,183	26,267
Annual % Change vs Prior Year	35.7%			16.5%			1.1%			-7.5%			22.5%
5 Year Average Per Year % Change		13.7%
	FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE		FYE	FYE
Williams-Sonoma	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
Alber CEO	11,923	10,110		10,110	9,212		9,212	13,555		13,555	2,385		2,385	3,665
Whalen CFO	2,830	3,243
Hayes	N/A	N/A
Stangl Former Officer	5,338	4,119		4,119	3,414
Connolly	2,576	2,523		2,523	2,567		2,567	1,802		1,802	1,085		1,085	1,603
McCollam Former CFO				N/A	N/A		2,623	9,840		9,840	2,310		2,310	3,731
Harvey Former Officer				1,473	2,280		2,280	2,008		2,008	1,157		1,157	1,108
Lester Former Chair and CEO										N/A	N/A		12,833	4,050
Jaffe GC										996	663		663	793
Totals	22,667	19,995		18,225	17,473		16,682	27,205		28,201	7,600		20,433	14,950
Annual % Change vs Prior Year	13.4%			4.3%			-38.7%			271.1%			36.7%
5 Year Average Per Year % Change		57.3%
10 Year Average Per Year % Change		35.5%