Downward nominal wage rigidity can be rephrased as: Nobody likes to get a pay cut. (Base) pay cuts piss employees off. When revenues fall, the stock price will fall, and automatically reduce employee salary as a result. But since the human perception of stock compensation is more like "gravy" than "essential to my way of life", I don't think that a stock price drop is as perceived to be as bad as a nominal pay cut, even though real employee pay is cut in either case.