[whatshisface]

The CEO is the only person in the company who can really negotiate for what they're worth (instead of the commodity price for their labor) because business people don't usually have specialized irreplaceable positions and technical people are not usually negotiation experts.

[dv_dt]

CEO pay is often set by compensation subcommittees of the board. On the board are typically people who have familiarity with high-level management, often, suprise!, CEOs of other companies. By bias or intent this leads to excessive CEO pay.