The financial newspapers are buzzing with the news of a coalition of business leaders stepping forward to propose executive compensation limits. I think this is only a secondary issue. Don’t get me wrong–I think the greed that has swamped the country at the executive suite level is astonishing. And it should be dealt with. The "but" in a moment.

   First, a little of the news. The Wall Street Journal:

A group of blue-chip companies is lining up behind efforts to voluntarily change their pay practices, in part to head off potentially more onerous restrictions out of Washington.

The Conference Board, a nonprofit business-research group, is set to announce Monday that companies including AT&T Inc., Cisco Systems Inc., Hewlett-Packard Co. and Tyco International Ltd., are endorsing a set of principles that hew closely to what the Obama administration is pushing, including tying pay to performance and reducing short-term financial incentives.

Another signatory to the report is the California State Teachers’ Retirement System, which invests in many large corporations.

   The Financial Times:

A coalition of US companies, investors and directors will on Monday propose a radical overhaul of executive pay, calling for the elimination of practices including severance payments, tax refunds and the personal use of corporate jets.

The group, formed by the Conference Board, a business organisation, will criticise corporate America for not reforming its compensation structures before the crisis, blaming that failure for causing a “loss of trust” in US companies.

   Krugman weighs in as well:

I was startled last week when Mr. Obama, in an interview with Bloomberg News, questioned the case for limiting financial-sector pay: “Why is it,” he asked, “that we’re going to cap executive compensation for Wall Street bankers but not Silicon Valley entrepreneurs or N.F.L. football players?”

That’s an astonishing remark — and not just because the National Football League does, in fact, have pay caps. Tech firms don’t crash the whole world’s operating system when they go bankrupt; quarterbacks who make too many risky passes don’t have to be rescued with hundred-billion-dollar bailouts. Banking is a special case — and the president is surely smart enough to know that.

All I can think is that this was another example of something we’ve seen before: Mr. Obama’s visceral reluctance to engage in anything that resembles populist rhetoric. And that’s something he needs to get over.

   So, what is my "but" here. The truth is that executives will always find some way around caps and limits. Once the heat comes off, which it will thanks to campaign contributions, business as usual will continue. And pay isn’t the main issue–it’s the pensions that are the real gold mine for executives and I haven’t seen much on that mentioned.

   The real problem is that tens of millions of Americans have gotten very little help in the past 30 years. Sure, put caps on exec pay. But, then, make it possible for millions of workers to unionize. Giving people the power to negotiate a decent paycheck–and put some control over what happens in corporate America–is the more important goal.

   A goal that, not coincidentally, is being blocked by the political establishement.