His Salary is 84.6 million. The 544 million was from the sale of 36,000,000 shares of stock, he had in the company.
When the "peasants" actually make a difference in the outcome of a company and do something special, something that anyone with a 4 year degree can't do, they will end up getting promoted, and making more money.
Why pay the guy who takes out the trash 20% more when the company has a good year, when his taking out the trash has absolutely nothing to do with how well the company does?
Lets expand on this, why pay a low level software engineer, which you can replace with any of the hundreds of thousands that graduate each year, 20% more?
"Peasant" pay is always going to be based on how much someone is willing to do the job for, and as long as a Company pays in line with what other companies pay, the employee is not going anywhere.
While if they continuously turn down requests from their star CEO, he very well may walk off the job, and take his expertise, and huge list of contacts, and use it to make more money elsewhere.
A good CEO is like a Star Athlete; they make or break the company.