The backlash against those appalling golden parachute payments for executives is gathering momentum. The DealLawyers blog alerts us to those moves in Congress forcing companies to ask their owners (i.e. shareholders) to approve golden parachute payments. It also provides some good links on this hot-button corporate governance issue. Still, a new study shows that most of the chief executive officers at the big US companies managed to get "gross up" provisions written into their contracts, allowing them to get around paying excise tax on their severance packages. Are these sweetheart deals in the interests of shareholders? If businesses want to introduce these sorts of deals, shouldn't they first get shareholder approval? Or do they just come with the territory?