Lofty Salaries
Congress required the lofty PCAOB salaries to discourage the board’s officials from leaving for jobs in the accounting industry. Doty earns $672,676 a year, while board members such as Ferguson make $546,891. By comparison, White earns $165,300 a year as SEC chairman and Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen makes $199,700.
High pay isn’t the only reason the PCAOB is a plum job. The board has historically escaped the media attention and congressional oversight that the SEC and other financial regulators often attract.
In a brief interview Wednesday, Doty said he wants a second term. He declined to discuss any conversations he’s had with SEC officials about the job.
Behind the scenes, his friends are lobbying on his behalf. Twenty-nine supporters of Doty’s, including former Fed Chairman Paul Volcker and Vanguard Group Inc. founder Jack Bogle, wrote White urging her to reappoint him.
The group, which includes former SEC chairmen Richard Breeden and Arthur Levitt, praised Doty’s leadership in reaching an agreement that allows PCAOB staff to police auditors of Chinese companies that trade on U.S. exchanges.
Auditor Names
Doty has occasionally clashed with some of the big accounting firms. The chairman, a lawyer who was once general counsel of the SEC, often highlights the high rate of deficiencies found by PCAOB inspectors who comb through company audits. Accounting firms have also fought Doty’s effort to require that auditor names be published in financial statements, a move that would reveal to investors who actually reviewed a company’s books. Audit reports have long carried only the firm’s identity.
White said Wednesday the SEC is in the midst of identifying “interested and qualified candidates” and declined to comment further.
White can’t decide on her own. The five-member SEC, which has been riven by its own political conflicts, has to vote on the appointment. In a sign of how fraught the selection of a chairman may be, Ferguson’s recent reappointment to the board dragged on for eight months before SEC commissioners voted in July to give him a second term.