Every once in awhile a politician or a large business owner will opt for join the Dollar-A-Year club. For some this means that they will only accept payment of $1 for a year or they may do this for a set amount of years. Usually this is because they have decided that they are well off and want to show the company and employees even the world that they are not doing what they are doing for the money, they are doing it for everyone else. The list is not very large, and not everyone gives up their bonuses. Mark Elliot Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook has decided join the 1-Dollar-Salary Club. The reasoning isn’t really clear to me as to why he is taking the salary cut, though it could be for the title. It could also be due to the amount of taxes he had to pay for the 2012 tax season. It could also be to show everyone he isn’t in it for the money, and that he is here to build Facebook to be the best social networking outlet available to the public. To join the 1-dollar-salary club is possibly one of the greatest status symbols of Silicon Valley, and one of most prestiges groups that one could join, showing the world that you are rich and successful, so you are going to continue doing everything you have been, but for free. On April 26th Facebook, INC released their 2013 Proxy Statement in which they disclosed the fiscal earnings of Mark Zuckerberg
In the first quarter of 2012, our compensation committee discussed and approved a request by our CEO to reduce his base salary to $1 per year, effective January 1, 2013. Cash Bonuses. Our 2012 Bonus/Retention Plan (Bonus Plan) provides variable cash incentives, payable semi-annually, that are designed to motivate our executive officers to focus on company-wide priorities and to reward them for individual results and achievements. All of our executive officers participated in the Bonus Plan in 2012. Our CEO will not receive a bonus under the 2013 Bonus/Retention Plan.
Below is a list of people who have joined the 1-Dollar-Salary Club (List provided from Wikipedia) Michael Bloomberg (Mayor of New York City) Sergey Brin (Google) Larry Ellison (Oracle Corporation) Darren Entwistle (TELUS) Richard Fairbank (Capital One Financial) Lee Iacocca (Chrysler Corporation) Steve Jobs (Apple), also did not take any alternative form of compensation (stock options, bonus, etc.) from 2003 until his death Richard Kinder (Kinder Morgan), also does not take any alternative form of compensation (stock options, bonus, etc.) James Li (Syntax-Brillian) John Mackey (Whole Foods Market), who also does not take any alternative form of compensation (stock options, bonus, etc.) Joseph Marinaccio (Slam Content) Larry Page (Google) Vikram Pandit (Citigroup) Mark Pincus (Zynga) Richard Riordan (Mayor of Los Angeles) Eric Schmidt (Google) Henry Samueli (Broadcom Corporation) Arnold Schwarzenegger (former Governor of California) Terry Semel (Yahoo!) Pantas Sutardja (Marvell Technology Group) Sehat Sutardja (Marvell Technology Group) Meg Whitman (Hewlett-Packard) Jerry Yang (Yahoo!) Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook) Source
I would be more impressed if they donated their salaries to charity
Don’t fall for this bullshit. He is paying himself $1 because the rest of his income is from stock options that are taxed at only 15%. Do more research next time before you praise him. This is loop hole manipulation at its finest.