Jeff Joerres retooled staffing giant Manpower - and didn't ask for a fat pay package.
And Citigroup (C) shareholders struck down a fat pay package for chief executive Vikram Pandit.
Bankers' fat pay packets have attracted much criticism, but a public-sector system that does not reward high achievers may be a much bigger problem for America.
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Click here for instant access to Investment Quality Trends for dozens of stable companies that pay fat dividends.
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Thursday, authorities asserted that Madoff's fund was a big Ponzi scheme, which took money from new investors to pay fat returns to old ones.
Big Oil remains a fat target to pay for it.
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When 5% of earners pay 60% of income taxes how fat a campaign check does it pay them to write to support tea-party politicians that promise no new taxes?
If unbundling fees means firms having to pay a fat retainer for advisory work, so be it.
The danger, though, is that Germany will instead succumb to pressure for ever-higher wage floors for individual sectors, leading to a workers' wage spiral that will be more damaging, if more popular, than the pay rises of fat cats.
But spending has been resilient mainly because unemployment is low and Americans' pay packets are still fat.
Thus the news over the weekend that the Swiss have voted to rein in executive pay packages should give pause to corporate fat cats everywhere.
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But everyone can grasp that using taxpayers' money to pay a large bonus, or a fat pension, to bankers who have crashed their banks is a hard sell during a recession.
"In other words, whether you build a business up over 30 years and then dispose of all or part of it, or whether you buy a bunch of shares at 0900 and then sell them at a fat profit at 1000, you'll now pay exactly the same 18% rate of tax, " said Robert Peston, the BBC's business editor.
The AMT is a shadow tax system ostensibly designed to make sure that fat cats with tax breaks like oil-well depletion pay at least some tax.
However, if the tissue is mostly fat in an obese patient, he will have to pay attention to diet and exercise to maintain the result, he said.
Most of the Republican candidates, including Mr Romney, the erstwhile scourge of the fat cats, argue that more of the poor should pay at least some income tax.
Although Britons are cross about high pay, few seek capitalism's overthrow: they dislike corporate fat cats for being fat, not for being cats.
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Well, a big part of it was the decision to downsize so they could pay off those three auto loans and put up a big, fat 35% down payment.
Investing has sunk to this: People are willing to pay a big premium for the privilege of getting their own money back, after fat fees, without interest apparently because it gives them the illusion of earning a high yield.
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You have to pay tax on the converted amount, but this tax bill vanishes if there happens to be a fat deduction on hand.
To sweeten its takeover, Pirelli proposed that Roberto Colaninno, outgoing boss of Telecom Italia and already a rich man thanks to the fat premium Pirelli paid him for his shares, should get a euro31m handout in lieu of options and other pay.
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