When those highly connected CEOs sit on the boards of eachothers companies and determine eachother's sallaries, "what someone else is willing to pay" is not an

When those highly connected CEOs sit on the boards of eachothers companies and determine eachother's sallaries, "what someone else is willing to pay" is not an independent variable. "People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices." — Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations, 1776