COMP NEWS – Amidst a wave of layoffs in the tech and finance industries, several CEOs are electing to cut their pay in an effort to retain talent and avoid making cuts to their workforce.
Six CEOs that are taking pay cuts to their annual bonuses or salaries in 2023 are:
Apple CEO Tim Cook
Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger
Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon
Morgan Stanley CEO James Gorman
Google CEO Sundar Pichai
JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon
Several of these CEOs’ companies have still trimmed their workforce of thousands of employees. Apple, however, has managed to avoid widespread layoffs, in part due to Apple CEO Tim Cook volunteering to take a 40% pay cut.
Apple CEO Tim Cook is taking a 40% pay cut in 2023, bringing his annual target salary to $49 million for the year, per documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission in January.
The executive requested the pay reduction himself, coming on the heels of recent controversy surrounding his hefty salary. In 2022, Apple investors were urged to vote against Cook’s nearly $100 million pay package by a shareholder advisory firm.
The SEC filing references “concern” over Cook’s total annual compensation in 2021 and 2022, noting the 2023 reduction comes amid “balancing shareholder feedback, a desire to continue to create meaningful performance and retention incentives, and Mr. Cook’s support for changes.”
Similarly, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger elected to trim his compensation by about 25% in order to prevent layoffs.
Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger announced on February 1 that he would take a 25% pay reduction this year, part of an effort to cut costs and prevent layoffs. Gelsinger will be joined by other top executives at the company, who also are taking salary cuts ranging from 5% to 15%.
“These changes are designed to impact our executive population more significantly and will help support the investments and overall workforce needed to accelerate our transformation and achieve our long-term strategy,” an Intel spokesperson told Insider’s Aidan Pollard.
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