It’s clear that something happened in corporate boardrooms around the 1970s and through to today, where they decided to give their CEOs massive amounts of money through salary and stock options. And why is that? Well, the fact that the top marginal tax rate had been cut in half, so more of that compensation would actually go to the individual, has to have something to do with that.

The Walton family, the heirs to the Wal-Mart fortune, provide an object lesson on income inequality. The math is pretty stark. This one family holds as much wealth as the bottom 30% of all Americans.

“You’re fired.”

Scary words, for most people.

But for CEOs of American companies, those two scary words still mean an outsized payday.

Ernst & Young estimates in a new publication [pdf] that half of all shareholder proposals in 2011 will deal with environmental and social issues, and support for these proposals is growing. In fact, “83 percent of investors now believe environmental and social factors can have a significant impact on shareholder value over the long term.”