Mulally's pay up 48 percent at Ford

DEARBORN, Mich., April 2 (UPI) -- U.S. automaker Ford Motor Co. can "forget about" asking for concessions from union workers in contract talks this year, a professor of labor relations said.

"If Ford expects the United Auto Workers to make more concessions, they can forget about it. The size of executive compensation is the final symbol that a company has turned around, so they can't plead for major cost-cutting," said Gary Chaison, professor of industrial relations at Clark University in Worcester, Mass.

Ford this week filed a proxy statement on executive salaries that put Chief Executive Officer Alan Mulally's salary at $26.52 million for 2010, an increase of 48 percent from 2009, The Detroit News reported Saturday.

The pay comes on top of $56.5 million in stock the company handed Mulally in February that covered several years of earnings, the newspaper said.

Executive Chairman Bill Ford Jr. was given $26.46 million in pay and a month ago was awarded $42.4 million in company stock.

Mulally took over Ford in 2006, and over the next three years it lost about $10 billion per year. But the company earned $9.28 billion in 2009 and 2010, including $6.6 billion last year.

UAW President Bob King in March called executive pay at Ford "outrageous."