Wal-Mart bosses get huge pay increases

Not everyone at Wal-Mart has a low income and is denied health insurance. The owners, who belong to the Walton family, routinely top the list of the world's richest people, together with Microsoft's Bill Gates and a selected few others.

Now, the company has announced major pay increases for its top managers, who already receive huge salaries.

H. Lee Scott Jr., Wal-Mart's president and chief executive, received a salary of close to 1.1 million last year, 13 per cent up from the previous year. But he also got a 5 million dollar restricted stock award, as a compensation for his hard work. The company also tells that it gave its CEO 521,634 stock options, worth 13.6 million dollars.

No wonder that Wal-Mart is trying to keep unions out in order to keep the wage bill down.