On April 7th, the Chairman and CEO of the giant investment firm Goldman Sachs said that banks and securities firms should pay their top executives mostly in stock awards that should be held for at least three years to tie the performance of those executives to the long term health of the company. He further suggested that lawmakers and regulators might have to force these changes on the industry.

Top executives at these companies have long resisted stockholder proposals to change their pay structure. Long overdue is a restructuring of corporate bylaws in this country that enable top management to effectively freeze out the owners of the company.

Another long fought over issue is direct nomination of board directors by shareholders. Here is a brief summary of SEC proposals in the past several years.