That is not correct.
Owner's don't align top management's interests with the owner's interests by giving them 'insane levels of compensation', they do it by giving the managements compensation in the form of shares of the company. It's not the volume of the compensation that aligns their interests, it's the type. Otherwise the 'top management' could just invest in the competitor and torpedo their own company making multiples of the original cash compensation as clients leave for the competitor.
IMO, if incentivizing good performance was really the goal, then companies would hire CEOs who are not already wealthy, pay them only enough base salary that they accept the job and can focus on it without worrying about paying bills, and compensate them mainly using illiquid, very long-dated stock options, which become worth a fortune if and only if the company is still around and profitable far into the future. It turns out that this is basically how founders are compensated, and it's a wonder that shareholders allow public-traded companies to be run in any other way.
I mean, the shareholders would most likely sue them out of existence for doing something like that.
It sorta breaks the CEO job into component parts which theoretically would reduce the executive compensations as the the replacement system is more interchangable.
Workers have a job because their labour produces value
Both statements can be true.
Um no, this doesn't happen. Nobody is paying useless people just to "show growth".
Why is management paid so much? Because they can make the argument "give me more, or I'll destroy the company", and actually be believable.
THAT is why it's so critical for CxOs to be aligned with owners' interests.