Japan Airlines CEO cuts his own salary – now makes less than pilots
November 25th, 2008 by James
CNN reports on JAL CEO Haruka Nishimatsu, who responded to times of trouble by cutting his own salary and benefits:
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Wow, repect for the old man! I really like his decision! That´s how it should be!
On the other hand, I have no problem with CEOs earning more than the normal employee, but it shouldn´t be like over 200million $ a year as mentioned in the video.
And the thing with managers getting bonuses for doing shitty work instead of getting cuts or being fired also always freaks me out -.-
PS: Damn, i can´t even imagine how he must be getting yelled at by his wife
We need more CEOs like him!
That’s the way it should be.
If he really earns all of 90k a year, then he’s a great guy and other CEO’s might want to think about this.
But I have to wonder what his stock options are like, he might just be pulling a fast one like some Western CEO’s do and taking a low salary but piling up cash in other ways.
That’s what I was thinking too. Oh well, either way it’s a gesture I’d like to see more of (CEOs taking a salary cut, not the deception).
What’d be even better would be to overhaul the businesses themselves and weed out the incompetents and improve protocol. Of course, this would benefit some business more than others but every day I see tons of time and money wasted on ineffective practices that could be improved with very little effort. Guess that wouldn’t really make for entertaining news, though.
Now it is GM CEO’s turn.
Amen!
And take their private jets too.
actually, almost the whole american auto industry.
Nice, maybe the other Japanese fat cats will follow suit. It’s only really in recent times anyway that the top corporate monkey suits are have upped their income, widening the gap between their normal employees and themselves.
Most of this whole *economic crisis* bullshit would probably be solved with people becoming less selfish.
“economic crisis bullshit” – I’m not sure what you mean by that?
It would hardly be solved by CEOs taking paycuts. It’s a little bigger than that.
Do you really think it is the CEO that has put GM in it’s current position? Somehow, I think the unions might have to take some of the blame. There is something inherently wrong with a system that has an uneducated factory worker making the same money, if not more than many lawyers I know.
Davis, you bring up a good point, its not solely the CEO’s fault, that would be ludicrous. But it is partly the CEO’s fault, and they are the leaders responsible for the companies well being.
More importantly, every time something goes right CEO’s are lauded as heroes, not the people who actually made it happen (Regardless of whether the CEO was brilliant or just a lucky dunce). They get the accolades, they get to take the fall too.
Nishimatsu is showing leadership by sharing the hardship. He’s showing empathy for his employees. They will notice and they’ll be all the more loyal to him for it.
The CEOs of major American car companies are indeed at fault. The reason they’re doing poorly is declining market share. Why? Because they’re building cars people don’t want–big trucks and sedans that get lousy mileage. The unions don’t have any say in that. The CEO and upper management does. They writing has been on the wall for years that fuel efficiency is the wave of the future, but they love the higher markups on SUVs and pickups. Did they think 150,000 American troops in Iraq was going to keep oil prices low? Apparently the anti-war protesters and the CEOs had something in common.
I went shopping for a new car last year. I looked really hard at American cars–I wanted an American car for my first new car. (Also, both of my in-laws work for the Detroit auto industry.) I knew a Dodge Jeep Chrysler dealer who could get me 25% off any new car I wanted. I looked at his selection and he didn’t have anything I wanted. It was pathetic. I still ended up buying American–a Escape Hybrid. But it was a near-run thing.
Oh, and my in-laws? They probably qualify as the mentioned “uneducated factory workers”, but they were by no means making anything near what any lawyer makes. And both of their jobs were exported to Mexico within a year. And these people and their families are still expected to ” buy American”?
We could use a lot more Nishimatsus in the U.S., where leadership apparently means going begging to Washington to ask the public to pay for your mistakes.
If it was a CEO from a company in another country, I would have to wonder if it wasn’t some PR stunt to gain customer loyalty. Or perhaps tax dodging?! Regardless, he seems genuinely honest in his reasons for taking such a humble pay cut. Pilots’ salary should be next, but unfortunately with pilot numbers are already short and with strong union backing that’s not something that’ll happen any time in the near future.
While his intentions may be more or less noble or for “the greater good”, I have a feeling the other CEOs will give words of praise for his brave decision, but dodge the question of whether they will follow suit in a manner like “Oh no, a person like me … I could never be as brave as Nishimatsu-san. I really admire him. I really do.” and then hold onto their own cushy salaries.
So many exemplary comments too…seriously, you people are working for the joy of it here, right? Right?
RRRRIIIIGHT!!!!
So…to be somewhat less joyful and more critical (that I might B paid by the line here)…do you suppose the mighty moral Haruka Nishimatsu made a killing before his stunning return to the Gandhi CEO remuneration levels? [Acutally, so much for salary reductions, what about the rest of the compensation package?]
My preconceptions (very similar to prejudices, but in the spirit of reductions…) are that Japanese mid-large company CEO remuneration is at least an order of magnitude lower than the US’s. Things could have changed since the last time I looked (2005), but I believe that change might have been even worse, not better, as the US CEOs try to keep up with the HF managers.
Happens in the US as well:
http://www.reuters.com/article/ousivMolt/idUSN28258020080728
Not here to debate CEO compenstation; however, 90K a year is a pipe dream in the US. I can’t imagine an executive recruiter floating that package around for any sizable, public company.