Programmers are paid so much because their work multiplies out to have huge impacts. CEOs are that on a much larger scale. There are plenty of CEOs who are ok or acceptable, but one that is 1% better means millions or billions extra in profit.

Companies with top tier management like Apple have had a non stop run of success for a while now and it’s not just luck. They pay Tim a $99 million package, and he certainly earns the company all that and more back.

That's really not how programmers are paid though. They're paid high salaries only when working at certain companies in some cities or countries, and mostly because it's hard to hire devs. Programmer pay has nothing to do with multiplier, but purely offer and demand in my opinion.

That's why I'm not sure why it's any different for CEOs. I've rarely seen a CEO repeat success from one place to another, granted I don't pay that much attention. But I doubt if you moved Tim to Microsoft that suddenly he could revive Windows Phone and overthrow Apples smartphone dominance.

I feel the evidence that a CEO has any significant impact on company output seems lacking. Yes they have impact in that they make important decisions, but compared to the decisions being randomly made or made by any other person that could have made them, can you really single out one CEO as being consistently beating others?

And can you ignore the executive staff and everyone else as well? How much is it the CEO or the particular set of people in the executive decision making branch, along with all the consulted employees?