Being the CEO of a multibillion-dollar global corporation is tough work. Or at least it had better be, considering the amount of money some of these folks were paid just to quit.

GMI Ratings recently released a detailed report — click here to read the PDF — on this blackjack of executives, many of them from businesses that are perennial Worst Company In America contenders, who cashed out with ridiculously large parting gifts.

But since you probably just want to see the list so you know how much to envy/hate/worship/aspire to become these erstwhile titans of industry, so here goes, in order from über-huge parachute to merely gaudy:

John F. Welch Jr.; General Electric (1981-2001) $417,361,902

Lee R. Raymond; Exxon Mobil Corp. (1993-2005) $320,599,861

William D. McGuire; UnitedHealth Group (1991-2006) $285,996,009

Edward E. Whitacre Jr.; AT&T (1990-2007) $230,048,463

Robert L. Nardelli; Home Depot Inc. (2000-2007) $223,290,123

John A. Kanas; North Fork Bank (1977-2006) $214,300,000

Fred Hassan; Merck & Co., Inc./Schering-Plough (2003-2009) $189,352,324

Louis V. Gerstner Jr.; IBM (1993-2002) $189,005,929

Hank A. McKinnell Jr.; Pfizer Inc. (2001-2006) $188,329,553

Thomas M. Ryan; CVS Caremark Corp. (1998-2011) $185,415,435

James M. Kilts; Gillette Co. (2001-2005) $164,532,192

Robert J. Ulrich; Target Corp. (1994-2008) $164,162,612

E. Stanley O’Neal; Merrill Lynch & Co. (2002-2007) $161,500,000

Jerry A. Grundhofer; U.S. Bancorp (2001-2006) $159,064,090

Joel F. Gemunder; Omnicare, Inc. (2001-2010) $146,001,476

Wallace D. Malone Jr.; Wachovia/South Trust (1981-2004) $125,292,818

George A. L. David; United Technologies Corp. (1994-2008) $122,631,309

Margaret C. Whitman; eBay Inc. (1998-2008) $120,427,360

Leonard Schaeffer; WellPoint Health (1992-2004) $119,041,000

Bob R. Simpson; XTO Energy Inc. (1986-2008) $103,485,972

Thomas E. Freston; Viacom (2006) $100,839,772

Golden Parachutes: 21 CEOs Landed $100M Plus [ABC News]

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