CEOs who fire people tend to make more money. That's been the trend recently, according to 'CEO Pay and The Great Recession' from the Institute for Policy Studies.

IPS:

The 50 top CEO layoff leaders received $12 million on average in 2009, compared to the S&P 500 average of $8.5 million. Each of the corporations surveyed laid off at least 3,000 workers between November 2008 and April 2010. Seventy-two percent of the firms announced mass layoffs at a time of positive earnings reports.

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At a time when we should be pulling together to strengthen our shared economic futures, CEOs should not be rewarded for slashing jobs," says IPS Senior Scholar Chuck Collins. "Realigning the interests of CEOs with their employees and the rest of our country would be good for the economy and national morale."

It's disturbing that down-sizing CEOs have earned more recently, but it would be extremely disturbing if the government could control companies behavior in this regard.

So while far from an optimal situation, we're not sure what could be done about it for private companies, without massively infringing on the rights of individuals (business owners). For example, some companies owners might want their paid managers (CEOs) to reduce staff. Still, it's horrible to be on the receiving end for sure. It's a tricky situation. You can see examples of the highest-paid 'Layoff Leaders' here.