In my opinion this article's headline is quite misleading and, the assumptions drawn from the information (or lack thereof), silly. The article itself points out that it's a total apples-to-oranges comparison when it states, "They [the companies] can pick various measures of pay to line up workers from highest to lowest, before choosing the person in the middle. Some use salary and wages alone. Others include various combinations of overtime, commissions, cash bonuses, equity awards, pension and 401(k) benefits, company-paid health-insurance premiums and more."
Another segment of the article that baffled me was Jeffrey Moore's statement, "...That leaves AT&T with more so-called pole climbers -- the installation, repair and maintenance workers that make up much of the telecom industry -- as well as more regional office staff. It's much more of a physical business. You've got to have a lot of low paid people to roll trucks and establish phone connections." -- Jeffrey Moore, a telecom-industry analyst and principal of Wave7 Research.