Private-college presidents often draw scrutiny for their hefty compensation packages, but most of them have a ready comeback: I could make a lot more money in the corporate world. While this statement is surely sometimes true, it is also true that some of the nation's top-paid presidents continue to receive perks that their corporate counterparts have relinquished under shareholder criticism. Among the 50 highest-paid private-college presidents in 2010, half led institutions that provided top executives with cash to cover taxes on bonuses and other benefits, a "Chronicle" analysis has found. This practice, known as "grossing up," has fallen out of fashion at many publicly traded companies, where boards have decided the perk is simply not worth the shareholder outrage it can invite. The author reports on how pay and perks creep up for private-college presidents.