I imagine it's much easier for a CEO to justify divesting money from the company's profits to himself and to the government at a 1:1 ratio than it is at a 1:20 ratio.

I would posit that the CEO-to-government ratio acts, in a roundabout way, as a profit-to-pushback ratio. As a CEO, it may not be worth facing the board's reaction to spending two million dollars just so that you get an extra hundred thousand dollars.