Incentive

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Throughout negotiations with the Charlotte Hornets, Larry Johnson said he wouldn't sign a contract with a first-year salary of $1.95 million.Yesterday, he did.After missing 27 days of the preseason, Johnson signed a six-year contract worth one dollar less than $20 million. If he fulfills an incentive clause, Johnson can make an additional $475,000 in the sixth, unguaranteed year.Johnson, the No. 1 overall pick in June's NBA draft, also received an escape clause following the fourth season that his agent said was crucial to an agreement.

DETROIT -- Struggling Ford Motor Co., which posted a record $12.7 billion loss in 2006, agreed to pay its new CEO, Alan R. Mulally, more than $28 million to help rescue the 103-year-old automaker, according to a filing yesterday with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Mulally, a former Boeing Co. executive who was the keynote speaker at the New York auto show this week, publicly accepted the Ford job in September. While his annual salary is set at $2 million, his compensation package for last year included $666,667 in salary for the final quarter of the year, as well as a host of other add-ons.

So we're supposed to appreciate the fact that Charm City Cakes is now making small cakes for us common folk priced at a mere $250? ("Now you can have your Charm City Cake -- and visit it, too," April 6). And the incentive is that you're allowed to actually step inside the place to pick up the overpriced thing? Graul's makes the best cakes around for under $20. And there are dozens of other great bakeries in this town (though they haven't been on TV). Every bakery in the country lets people come in and look around.

According to the latest agreement, if Mayo A. Shattuck III, CEO of Constellation Energy Group Inc. and future chairman of FPL Group Inc., leaves the merged company: Within the first year after the deal closes, he would get $15 million in cash, if he's dismissed or leaves after his duties are reduced. After the first year, the cash severance would drop to $5 million, if he leaves within three years under those same conditions. But while his severance would drop after the one-year mark, he would also get a stock grant equal to the amount of his cash severance under his old agreement.

Maryland auto dealers were told yesterday that they need to embrace the Internet and revise their way of doing business with computer-savvy customers if they want to remain viable. "The Internet has leveled the playing field between consumers and dealers," Jacob J. Cohen, managing director of the automotive services group of American Express Tax and Business Services Inc., told 50 dealers attending the company's e-business conference at the Pikesville Hilton. Less profit per sale Cohen said car buyers have far more information today and this is reducing the profit a dealer makes on each car sale.

LEVI STRAUSS & Co.'s new employee bonus plan seems a salve for the sores of a downsized economy.This month Levi promised an extra year's pay to each of its 37,500 employees if the company hits its profit targets by November 2001. The scheme could cost the jeans maker $750 million, and 2,000 Levi Strauss workers cheered its announcement outside the company's San Francisco headquarters."Motivated employees are our source of innovation and competitive advantage," Chairman Robert D. Haas told the crowd.

DETROIT -- General Motors Corp. paid its chairman, John Smith Jr., a compensation package of $9.2 million last year, an increase of 7.8 percent from 1996, as the automaker posted record earnings.Smith, 60, received a salary of $1.75 million, unchanged from 1996, according to a proxy statement filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. His annual incentive rose 53 percent to $2.45 million, while his long-term incentive pay fell 55 percent to $1.04 million.Smith was the only top GM executive whose pay rose last year, according to the filing.

General Dynamics Corp., the nation's second-largest defense contractor, rejected Maryland's advances and announced yesterday that it would move its corporate headquarters to Northern Virginia from St. Louis.The announcement was a blow to state officials who have spent the last three weeks wining and dining executives of the maker of the F-16 jet fighter and Tomahawk cruise missile.Gov. William Donald Schaefer, describing himself as "very, very disappointed" said he didn't understand why Maryland had lost the competition for the prestigious headquarters.

SARASOTA, Fla. -- Right-handed pitcher Ben McDonald agreed to terms on a one-year contract that could pay him as much as $500,000 for the 1992 season.McDonald, who last year completed the three-year deal he signed after becoming baseball's No. 1 draft choice in 1989, accepted a base salary of $355,000 and an incentive package that could add $145,000, if he pitches 200 innings and makes an undisclosed number of starts.The agreement averted a renewal showdown with the club and may have smoothed over the team's relationship with agent Scott Boras, whose contentious style during earlier negotiations appeared to alienate the Orioles front office.

As President Bush was prodding Iran to swiftly accept a U.S.-backed package of incentives to give up its nuclear ambitions, America's top military leader in Iraq was blaming Tehran for an increase in insurgent attacks that target Americans and Iraqis. The report last week by Gen. George W. Casey Jr. was a sobering reminder of Iran's duplicitous dealings with the West and another reason why the nuclear standoff with Tehran must be settled. While initially upbeat about the incentive package, Iran has yet to formally respond.