That's why it stings to see West pulling down a package in 2008 worth over $6 million, according to calculations made by the Associated Press. While Hershey may not have gone down as badly as the rest of the market has, I can tell you that such a fact is of little consolation to those who have seen their paper worth suffer.

Although I don't own Hershey in my portfolio, I do own Disney (NYSE: DIS), and I've commented before on Bob Iger's own excessive pay. We're all in this together. Believe me, I can sympathize.

I'm afraid the practice of overpaying chief executives will always be with us. For some reason, shareholders choose to remain complacent on this issue. They almost seem to feel a weird form of empathy toward the guy or gal in the top spot in terms of the pressure that such a position entails. Some investors also seem to feel that those who criticize pay packages are somehow less than capitalistic.

Quite honestly, it's simply a case of being efficient and cutting costs. Any amount of money that can be conserved is a good amount, and companies should be aggressive on this count. I'm not sure how that can be interpreted as being anything less than capitalistic. At any rate, I wouldn't make a buy/sell decision based on this amount of compensation, and I will reiterate my feeling that Hershey should prosper over time from its valuable portfolio of confections.

That doesn't mean, however, that shareholders shouldn't fight to minimize CEO pay. We simply need neither the cash expense nor the dilution from the issuance of options. What we do need are shareholder-friendly boards and reasonable salaries for employees, even those at or near the top of the executive hierarchy. Talk about rare commodities!

Disclosure: I own Disney; positions can change without notice.