Clifford received his B.A. from
Columbia University in 1964 and his M.B.A. from
Harvard Business School in 1968. During the
New York City financial crisis of the 1970s, he was a special deputy comptroller of
New York City, where he was credited for creating the city's integrated financial management system (IFMS) between 1975 and 1977. From 1987 to 1992, Clifford was CEO of
King Broadcasting Company and then
National Mobile Television from 1992 to his retirement in 2000. In 2017, Clifford published
The CEO Pay Machine: How It Trashes America and How to Stop It, a book that reveals how corporations craft their compensation packages and criticizes what Clifford calls "outrageous" pay of corporate chief executives, arguing that excessive pay would hurt American businesses and shareholders. In 2019, he delivered a testimony in the
United States House Committee on Financial Services. During the
COVID-19 pandemic, Clifford's criticism of the corporate pay gap and call to rein in their compensation packages were cited by multiple critics and publications. Clifford sits on the board of
KING-FM, and has been a director of companies including
Mosaica Education and
Todd Shipyards. == References ==