It's the same thing with cops and firefighters. Their pensions are calculated based on the earnings of the last few years of employment. So that save vacation days the last few years to inflate their earnings the last few years.
If there is one thing you can count on, it's human greed. And I'm not pretending I'm above it myself.
The problem is that the system is set up to be exploited by the CEOs/etc.
Hoo boy, but if a CEO has self-interests that involve steering the company in a socially responsible direction (or maybe just being less extractive), cries of fiduciary duty to shareholders ring out.
One of these is an ongoing source of considerable societal damage. The other is illegal.
I'm not very equipped to judge legally what is or is not a crime, but it does seem like there's a lot of leeway for people in control of public companies to effectively take money from their investors.
Most laws are just enforcing social norms