Warner Bros Discovery shareholders vote against CEO David Zaslav’s $51.9m annual pay for 2024 – but it’s unlikely to make a difference.
While people trying to get films and TV shows made continue to battle declining budgets and belt-tightening across the industry, there’s little danger that CEOs of big entertainment companies are sharing the pain.
Just yesterday, amidst news of another raft of layoffs, we were talking about Disney head honcho Bob Iger trousering over $40m in salary and stock options for one year’s work. But even he’s out-earned by renowned Warner Bros Discovery boss David Zaslav, a man whose tenure at the top of that company looks set to be forever definite by his decision to delete completed movies in exchange for a tax break.
Zaslav’s 2024 pay packet for his cutting and deleting amounted to $51.9m. And while he’s likely to still get his money in the end, shareholders at the company have now voted against the financial package. It’s part of an indicative say on pay vote, where shareholders at publicly traded companies in the US get to indicate their views on CEO-level recompense. 59% of shareholders who took part in the ballot voted against Zaslav’s salary. That fact that it’s a non-binding vote means the board of Warner Bros Discovery can still press ahead and deliver the bank notes to Zaslav’s home.
In fact, a statement from Warner Bros Discovery does a fine job of playing lip service with little indication of substance behind it.
The statement says that the Warner Bros Discovery board of directors “appreciates the views of all its shareholders and takes the results of the annual advisory vote on executive compensation seriously. The Compensation Committee of the Board looks forward to continuing its regular practice of engaging in constructive dialogue with our shareholders.”
How seriously does it take it? Well, there’ll be an easy way to tell. Should Zaslav’s salary be chopped in half, to a level still far in excess of the many people who work for him, yet still enough to live on? Then that might be progress.
But don’t hold your breath.
