Disneyland's CEO Makes As Much As His Entire Park's Combined Payroll

[Initech]

Disneyland is famously promoted as the "happiest place on earth." But for many of the theme park's 30,000 employees, it isn't the happiest place to work. That's what we discovered after spending a year talking with Disneyland workers and conducting a survey of about 5,000 "cast members," as the company refers to its employees.

Since 2000, Disneyland's attendance (more than 27 million in 2016), daily ticket prices ($117 most days of the year for anyone over the age of 10) and revenues (more than $3 billion) have increased, but during that period, its employees' pay has dropped 15% in real dollars.

Our survey of food service workers, hair stylists, costumers, candy makers, security guards, custodians, hotel workers, retail workers, ticket takers, musicians, puppeteers, singers and dancers affiliated with 10 different unions revealed that 85% of Disneyland employees are paid less than $15 an hour. Even among full-time employees who have worked at Disneyland for more than 15 years, 54% are paid less than $15 an hour and 13% are paid less than $11 an hour.

Workers at the Anaheim resort are paid so little that more than 1 in 10 report being homeless at some point in the last two years, two-thirds say they don't have enough food to eat three meals a day and three-quarters say they can't afford basic expenses every month.

<snip>

If that plan goes through and the company reaches its other major goals, Chief Executive Robert Iger will see his pay quadruple to $162.5 million a year. That would make his annual compensation equal to the total pay of 9,284 Disneyland workers.
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-dreier-flaming-disneyland-employee-survey-20180228-story.html

Holy fuck this is insane. This has got to change. One guy isn't worth what 9,000 employees are worth.

[HopeAgain]

1. Welcome to the new America

America has been sleeping while the 1% has been robbing us blind.

[Stallion]

6. That's a Lot of Money!!! Thank Gawd Trump Lowered His Taxes

Free-DUMB

[Takket]

8. yeah.... this isn't a Disney problem, it is a society problem

You could write the same article about almost any major company. Until living wage and equal pay for women are instituted, this will just continue. And the tax scam has already done exactly what we all knew it would... allowed companies to buy buy stock, enrich the shareholders, and trickle down NOTHING

[GWC58]

28. The 1980 election of Sir Ronald of

RayGun was the start of this!

[gopiscrap]

2. that's fucked up

[fleur-de-lisa]

3. Ridiculous! And folks wonder why we're losing our status as leader of the free world.

[PatentlyDemocratic]

4. Anyone number of people could do his job

These executives aren’t special. Any number of people could easily replace him. Shareholders and employees should be furious.

[Eliot Rosewater]

5. It absolutely has to change, BUT .... BUT

be very wary and careful of who is telling you to change it.

There is an agenda out there that is huge; includes well known celebrities, politicians, etc., dedicated to changing it but not to your or my benefit.

Sold on the idea that Wall Street is the villain, and they are, they propose radical change but in the end this will not benefit us.

Just be careful who you listen to.

[ProfessorGAC]

7. Don't Get Me Wrong. . .

. . .$162.5 million a year is obscene, but Iger is the CEO of the entire Disney corporation, not just the them park(s).

While the rest of the situation in Anaheim is pretty pathetic, i would need to see how the overall pay scale across all Disney properties look to make an overall comparison. What do the electricians and mechanics at Disneyland make?

Now if i found that the average person working in Bristol at ESPN was making under $20, or ABC, or the movie companies, then i'd find it to be fairer comparison and even more reason to be outraged.

Of course, i'd still end up thinking nobody is worth >$160 million a year (or half of that, or maybe not even 30%) but this article does seem to comparing apples to oranges, or perhaps apples to pears.

Again, you'd never get me to accept that anything Iger does is worth that kind of money. I mean, how hard it to take over as CEO of Disney. It's not like they're a recent start up or were a struggling corporation for a couple decades.

This article just seems a tad hyperbolic.

[Initech]

12. Rent here is fucking ridiculous.

New apartment complexes are going up all the time - and a lot of them are struggling to fill residents because they just can't afford the obscene cost of rent here. New apartments go for $2K a month plus. And that's not even factoring in the cost of utilities, food, and all the other things you need to live. It's not that far off - I live here. I know how insane rent is. The rent is too damn high and the pay is too damn low!

[ProfessorGAC]

17. I Get That

I've been to Anaheim MANY times. Had relatives, when a kid, who lived in Santa Ana. We have a site in Anaheim that i've worked at at least 35 times. I really do understand it's expensive to live there.

My point was certainly not that the people who work at the park couldn't use better pay. Clearly, they could. That's not in question.

I'm just point out that while the situation in Anaheim is a financial problem, for those workers, comparing CEO pay to those folks which is a tiny fraction of the overall company is a little specious.

As i said, you'd still never convince me that being CEO of Disney is worth more than $160 million. That's preposterous.

What i'd like to see is there breakdown for other parts of their organization, the pay in Orlando (while not cheap, it isn't SoCal) and then places like New York, Bristol, etc. I'd bet they treat park workers differently than they do a lot of their other segments. (Another problem.)

Either way, i'm sure everybody here believes that Iger is WAY(!!!!!) overpaid. And at Disney, that's been true since Eisner.

[onenote]

19. +1

[kcr]

24. + a million!!!!1111

[kcr]

22. Hyperbolic. Really?

Do you think three-quarters of the workers at ESPN struggle with basic expenses? 1 in 10 have been homeless?

[ProfessorGAC]

29. Really, Yes

And to be super clear, the CEO is paid a preposterously high and unconscionable salary!
The analysis here is not good, and makes questionable comparisons.
Yes, pay the park workers considerably more and him monumentally less. Doesn't make the comparison apt.

[Wellstone ruled]

9. Now add in his Stock Options.

You can add a couple hundred million to his pay day.

[onenote]

26. Theyre included in he compensation estimate in the article.

[Calculating]

10. Sadly this doesn't surprise me much

The income inequality issue just gets worse and worse with no sign of slowing.

[Initech]

14. And our president is doing nothing to help.

In fact he's a part of the problem.

[exboyfil]

11. I used to live two miles from Disneyland

The house I grew up in now lists for over $500K. It is a 1100 ft. 3 br ranch. I can't imagine making $15/hr under those conditions. I am not even entirely sure how they are doing it.

[Firestorm49]

13. Good

Thank God he’s getting by........as the price of admission restricts more and more families of limited means.

[Kablooie]

15. My brother has been working at Disneyland scheduling ride operators and running rides for 21 years.

He still only makes $40k a year and has been pretty depressed about it recently.

[budkin]

16. Absolutely ludicrous

This shit has to stop.

[onenote]

18. There is income inequity for sure, but the story (and the OP headline) are misleading

First, I'm not defending Iger's compensation (which was $36.4 million in 2017) or the disparity between his compensation and that of Disney employees.

But the story itself does not say that Iger's current (or even projected) compensation is equal to the entire park's combined payroll. Indeed, it says that the park has 30,000 employees and that if Iger's compensation quadruples, it would equal the compensation of around 9300 of those 30,000 employees. (Presumably that means that today Iger's compensation is equal to the combined comp of around 2300 of those employees; or put another way, the combined compensation of the 30,000 park employees is around 14 times Iger's current compensation).

Moreover, Iger is CEO of not just the Disneyland theme park, but of the entire Disney corporation, which has nearly 200,000 employees. Assuming that the average comp of all those employees is the same as the average comp of park employees (which almost certainly understates the total comp), Iger's compensation is a fraction of the combined compensation of the 200,000 employees of his company. And while his comp will grow (particularly through stock options) if the Fox deal goes through, so too will the size of the company he runs.

Again, my point isn't to defend Iger's bloated compensation or the undercompensation of Disney's employees, particularly park employees. It's to point out that it doesn't help when the numbers are fudged. The real numbers are bad enough.

[moondust]

20. The King does all the work!

Everybody knows that! We must be thankful that there are a few omnipotent Kings among us to keep the sky from falling!

[BSdetect]

21. Every deplorable thinks they have a chance to be that guy.

[Yavin4]

23. And he just got a big fat tax cut

so that should balance things out.

[ProudLib72]

25. Serious question

Putting aside all the ranting and raving about income disparity, what is a practical solution? Maybe CEO making 1% of gross revenue? I mean, a plan like that seems good on the one hand because it means he would work toward making the brand more lucrative (there is incentive), but there is equal incentive to cut costs or raise prices. What about capping pay? Who decides what pay should be capped at, some board of directors who want even more money? Government? If it's government, is it state level or federal?

[sarisataka]

27. Actual title of article

Disneyland's workers are undervalued, disrespected and underpaid

The article never states "Disneyland's CEO Makes As Much As His Entire Park's Combined Payroll"


And no I don't believe anyone is worth $160+million per year

[onethatcares]

30. if you filled your bedroom with

162.5 million fishing rods, people would say that you are sick and have a problem. They might question the fact you never use them.But if you fill your bedroom with 162.5 million one dollar bills, you're a CEO and a man to be respected.

That's a sickness.