By Michael Wood, Third and State

In the news today, a couple of instances of CEOs being taken to task by shareholders over excessive pay.

USA Today reports that at Citigroup, 55% of shareholders rejected or abstained from rubberstamping a $25 million payday for their CEO Vikrom Pandit. The vote is only advisory, unfortunely, but is still described as being "historic" for Wall Street firms in the aftermath of the recession. The report notes:

Wall Street's massive compensation packages have raised the ire of shareholders for years, especially when they appear to have little relation to the performance of specific executives. ...

"Citigroup is one of most egregious example of disconnect between incentives of top management and value creation of shareholders," said Mike Mayo, bank analyst at brokerage firm CLSA and author of the book "Exile on Wall Street."

"The owners of the big banks, namely the shareholders, are finally taking a greater amount of responsibility by speaking up."

Closer to home, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette has a story this morning about discontent at Pittsburgh-based EQT's annual shareholder meeting. Again, executive compensation seems to be at the heart of this dispute — as well as unease about natural gas production. 

Even though the Buffett Rule failed to get a vote in the U.S. Senate earlier this week, it seems that income inequality is on the minds of many Americans right now — as it should be. (In case you missed it, check out the Keystone Research Center and Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center's fact sheet on the Buffett Rule and what it means to Pennsylvania.)