Abigail Disney Slams Walt Disney Company over $1.5 Billion Executive Bonuses as It Furloughs Workers
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Abigail Disney, an heiress to the Walt Disney legacy, slammed the Walt Disney Company for slashing workers’ pay while dolling out massive executive bonuses in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.
The world’s largest entertainment conglomerate announced this week that it was putting half its workforce on unpaid leave after shuttering its theme parks, hotels, and retail outlets in response to the coronavirus.
However, the company also decided not to alter its bonus schemes for high-paid executives. While executive chairman of Disney Bob Iger and CEO Bob Chapek decided to waive their salaries during the crisis, they will continue reaping the benefits of their compensation packages in incentive and bonus plans. Indeed, their annual salaries are only a small portion of their yearly compensation deals.
Abigail Disney found hypocrisy in the company’s move. She took to Twitter with a long thread to excoriate the “nice rhetoric” that only served to disguise the “pillaging and rampaging [of workers] by management.”
“WHAT THE ACTUAL F***????? Look, dividends aren’t ALL bad, given the number of fixed income folks who rely on them. But still 80% of shares are owned by the wealthiest 10%. So that excuse only goes so far. But the REAL outrage is, of course, those bonuses,” she said. “All 1.5 billion of them. 1.5 BILLION. That’d pay for three months salary to front line workers. And its going to people who have already been collecting egregious bonuses for years.”
OK, I've been holding my tongue on the theory that a pandemic is no time to be calling people out on anything other than failing us in a public health sense. I thought it might be a moment for peace and reconciliation. But I feel a thread coming on....1/ twitter.com/lisaabramowicz…
WHAT THE ACTUAL F***????? Look, dividends aren't ALL bad, given the number of fixed income folks who rely on them. But still 80% of shares are owned by the wealthiest 10%. So that excuse only goes so far. But the REAL outrage is, of course, those bonuses...2/
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All 1.5 billion of them. 1.5 BILLION. That'd pay for three months salary to front line workers. And its going to people who have already been collecting egregious bonuses for years. Here is what the @ft piece has to say about it: 3/
"Disney protected incentive schemes, which account for most of the executives’ remuneration. Mr Iger earned $65.6m in 2018 and $47m last year, The latest package is more than 900 times that of the median Disney worker’s earnings, which stands at about $52,000." 4/
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And continuing: "Mr Chapek could potentially earn an annual bonus “of not less than 300 per cent” of salary, in addition to a long-term incentive award of “not less than $15m” This is why I was quiet in March when executives at the company made a big pr push to 5/
Call attention to the fact that they were giving up a portion of their salaries for the year. I told people to wait until we heard about the rest of the compensation package, since salary is a drop in the bucket to these guys. The real payday is in the rest of the package 6/
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Last year Abigail Disney bashed CEO Iger for earning “roughly 173 times the median Disney worker’s” pay. Also last year, she was seen stumping for a “wealth tax” as a member of a George Soros-backed, left-wing activist group. And in 2014, she joined other anti-Jewish groups in calling for divestment in companies based in Israel.
In her Twitter rant, Disney noted that she is not a member of Disney’s management, but she is an heir: “And I do carry this name with me everywhere. And I have a conscience which makes it very difficult for me to sit by when I see abuses taking place with that name attached to them.”
See her Twitter thread below.
By design because it is taxed differently. Shareholders have twice voted to rebuff the outrageous pay, so it's not just that common decency is being flouted here. Its the will of their allegedly all-important "owners." Iger's comp will still be 900 times median wage. 7/
But it gets worse. The front line workers at the parks had to fight for years to get their pay bumped up to $15/hr and the pr folks touted that as incredible magnanimity on management's park, but if you know the back story, which I do, you would be horrified to know just 8/
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how hard they made it for the people asking for that $15. The way they floated around congratulating themselves it was damn hard to take. If a frontline worker gets 40 hours a week(and that's a big if, since just like everyone else, Disney shaves away hours to keep folks from 9/
being full time) 52 weeks a year (again a big if, esp since they don't have paid sick days unless they get 40 hours, which, see above parenthetical statement) they pull down 31,200 per year. Sounds nice till you consider gas prices and the housing market in Orange County 10/
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(It's weird to note, btw, that both Disney's, Land and World, are in Orange Counties, but anyway) So Iger's compensation for THIS YEAR will amount to 1,500x their pay. Chapek's, if he gets the full amount, is 300% of his 3 million base pay, or $9MM. 288x the front liners' 11/
And 173x his median workers pay, plus another 15MM over the long term. What kind of person is comfortable with this??? If you have a shred of empathy in your body, if you care even a little about your employees, if you believe a word of your nice rhetoric about how, 12/
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Acc to Mr Chapek, "Our ability to do good in the world starts with our cast members . . . who create magic every day. Our commitment to them will always be our top priority." If even a whiff of this is sincere, none of this compensation bullshit is possible. 13/
THIS COMPANY MUST DO BETTER. Disney faces a rough couple of years, to be sure. The challenges are existential, even. But that does not constitute permission to continue pillaging and rampaging by management. In fact, if a bonus reflects performance, we might want to claw 14/
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Back some of those millions given how they've managed cash. Between March 31, 2018 and June 30 of 2019 the company made $11.5 billion of stock buybacks. ELEVEN. POINT. FIVE. BILLION. Now no one could have foreseen this crisis. That is an absolutely fair thing to say. 15/
But ANYONE, could have anticipated SOME crisis. That's one of the things responsible managers do. And good, solid, competent management is why they get the "big bucks" we are told. But those buybacks are beginning to look pretty self indulgent right now 16/
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And whom do buybacks enrich? Well, shareholders, and again, that's great for people on fixed incomes, sure, but who gains the most? Well if you are being compensated in shares and you drive the price up in buybacks that works out really nicely for you, doesn't it? 17/
And therein lies another piece of terrible management, worse even the buy backs and the compensation. They have consistently tried to PR their way through a series of messes of their own making, and that will only last for so long. 18/
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I don't have a role at the company, which is fine with me. I'm just a citizen who cares and I think that makes me free to say what I believe. But I am an heir. And I do carry this name with me everywhere. And I have a conscience which makes it very difficult for me to 22/
sit by when I see abuses taking place with that name attached to them. This isn't all that hard. This isn't all that complicated. Just give up SOME of your already ample compensation, especially this year. Give up, god forbid two or three basis points on the annual return 23/
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Analysts will shout and scream and have little temper tantrums. Who cares. You are bigger than they are. And as the biggest, most exceptional, most iconic guy in town, you could CHOOSE TO LEAD. If you do, who knows who would follow you. We have a moment here. A crisis24/
is always an opportunity for change. Reassess this mess you've made of the good will you got handed on which you depend more than you like to admit. And pay the people who make the magic happen with respect and dignity they have more than earned from you. BE DECENT. END
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