The situation tw describes there is similar to the way things work in many of the larger companies/organisations in the UK.
I have no objection to the head of a company earning significantly more than the people s/he employs. I completely agree that they have a huge weight of responsibility and if that responsibility is a genuine one it must weigh heavily indeed. My problem lies with the fact that in several well documented instances (and one wonders how many not so well documented instances exist), the people who should have been bearing that weight and who were being paid hundreds of times more than their employees because of it, were not held to be responsible. Instead they were rewarded for their failure.
In some of these cases, the knock on effect of their incompetence was job losses amongst the workforce. People who did their jobs competantly and were paid an average wage lost their jobs because of the incompetance of the person in charge; whilst the person who'd caused their job loss and compromised the health of the entire organisation were rewarded with record bonuses. Bonuses that made the lifetime earnings of their employees look like pocket money.
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And this enormous weight of responsibility, surely it places a strain on this person, yes? Loss of time with the family, constant stress leading to health issues, and the knowledge that if any one part of a massive machine slips out of balance, the axe hanging over your head will drop, even if it wasn't even remotely your fault. But that's the job, to be omniscient, and to bear the responsibility for the whole organization (not just one project, one department, or one facility).
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Okay the size of the responsibility is greater. But, the level or work and expertise required to fulfil that responsibility is not necessarily as unique within the company as their role may be.
My dad was a maintenance electrician in a mid-size bakery for twenty-odd years. He was the chief electrician so it was his responsibility to make sure everything kept running. The maintenance crew did most of their overhauls and upkeep at night so Dad was primarily a night-worker (which impacted on family life). If there was a major breakdown the cost implications to Mellings were severe. Everything is on a smaller scale than the large companies we've been talking about, but it takes a lot less to sink a smaller company.
Dad didn't bear the whole responsibility for the company, but he bore full responsibility for keeping the company's factory running. If you think that wasn't high stress, think again. The amount of times Dad had to jerry-rig or invent some wild solution to keep production going when a machine broke and the right part wsn't available.
The CEO of a large company is responsible for the whole thing. He has to be omniscient...except that he doesn't. He has to be wholly responsible, but I doubt the CEO actually looks at individual stationery orders, he has other people to look and filter the relevant information through to him.
Dad was only looking after one factory of machines, ovens, timers and conveyers. But he had to be aware of every screw. The potential consequences to his little world if he screwed up, or got very unlucky, were just as great as the consequences to the CEO's much bigger world if he screws up or gets unlucky: production problems, logistic and financial consequences, the potential for destabilising a business which is operating within tight margins and ultimately, if the mistake was big enough and particularly badly timed, a need for cost-cutting exercises leading to job losses.
My Dad never earned above £20k.