Jeff Bezos announced that for 20 years, he took salary of $80,000 from Amazon. He became one of the richest businessmen in the world. Even being the founder, still he felt uncomfortable taking on more as he already owns a big part of it. “My view was I was a founder,” he explained. “I already owned a significant amount of the company and I just didn’t feel good about taking more.”.
Despite this modest salary, Bezos was able to make $8 million every hour from 2023 to 2024 by virtue of his 10% stake in Amazon. As he added, “I had plenty of incentive. I owned more than 10% of the company. I just felt, how could I possibly need more incentive?”
Since Bezos’ resignation as the Amazon’s Chief Executive Officer, he is selling his Amazon shares gradually. He said that 25 million more of Amazon shares would be sold till the end of 2025. Bezos went on to inform the board, “I asked the compensation committee of the board not to give me any compensation,” further saying he would have felt “icky” taking any more dollars and is proud to state that he made his flat compensation decision with “honor.”.
Lower wages can also cut the taxes of billionaires. For example, Bezos paid no federal income taxes in 2007 and 2011 because his investment losses exceeded his salary. Other billionaires, such as Elon Musk, Warren Buffett, and Michael Bloomberg, have done the same, thus reducing their taxes to much less than the federal income tax rate of 37%.
