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AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson's total compensation was more than $32 million in 2019, giving him a 10 percent raise while he slashed tens of thousands of jobs and reduced spending on network upgrades. Stephenson's total compensation was $28.72 million in 2017, $29.12 million in 2018, and $32.03 million in 2019, an AT&T filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission said. His pay raise was driven by stock performance.
[...]But Stephenson's 2019 compensation rose "after a headline-grabbing hedge fund battle ended up boosting the telecom and media giant’s share price," The Wall Street Journal reported today. The 10 percent increase came "almost entirely on the strength of AT&T’s stock appreciation," as AT&T shares rose about 37 percent during 2019, the Journal article said.
[...]AT&T has been trying to reduce its debt load, which was $163.1 billion total and $151.3 billion in long-term debt at the end of 2019. Stephenson might not get another pay increase this year given the turmoil in stock markets that has sent AT&T tumbling in recent days. Stephenson is nearing retirement, but AT&T has said he will remain in the top role through all of 2020.
20,000 jobs cut assuming, $50,000 per year, is $1 billion dollars saved per year. Even if the CEO wanted to give all of his income to the workers, he would have saved about 3.2%, or 640, jobs this year. Sounds better if you just blame him for the 20,000 job cuts, though.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 12 2020, @11:18PM (5 children)
I think someone on here said it best, something like stuff like this is just a glitch in captialism. And he was right. We need serious reforms in how business is conducted. These are primal beasts that we are using to advance our burden, and the way the system has evelved has been outstripped by the speed and innovation of the private sector. To allow blatantly bad decisions to be incredibly rewarded is bad for us all. It's not the people that are broken, it's the outdated way we handle the systems we create that is, imho there is hope but the dynamic of how most people interact with the systems that rule society needs to change. #takethepowerback #bustthetrusts #teachcriticalthinking
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 13 2020, @02:26AM (1 child)
It's not a glitch, it's a foundational principle.
When the owners slough off a bunch of workers, their costs go down and they calculate the productivity of the remaining workers goes up. It's a pure calculation.
According to this ideal, the worker offers his labor at the market rate. The reality is that productivity is a sensitive function of morale. You know the difference between hanging out with your friends and hanging out with co-workers - that's what a difference in morale feels like.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 13 2020, @12:24PM
It's not a foundational principle, it's a problem. In fact, one well-known enough to have it's own name, the principle-agent problem.
You might also want to check into how much of cooperate structure is legally or regulatorily mandated.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 13 2020, @11:43AM
> We need serious reforms in how business is conducted.
Systems don't reform. They collapse.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Friday March 13 2020, @05:38PM (1 child)
Glitch, or inevitable emergent behavior?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 13 2020, @08:34PM
Glitch, because in a proactive world this would be accounted for and the accounting factors enforced, so something isn't working right.