As an example, the US president is getting around $400k per year. Meanwhile a CEO of a large corporation can easily get tens of millions of dollars per year. Likewise members of the US Senate are paid a lot less than board members of a typical multi-billion dollar corporations. Obviously elected officials have other ways of making money after retirement but usually they force them into a conflict of interests - e.g. the public speeches made by Senator Clinton before her presidential run.
So why aren't politicians getting a reasonable salary compared to their corporate counterparts? At the very least this would make them a lot less susceptible to corruption and at best it would attract people who wouldn't consider to run otherwise.