An unfair act of economic oportunism and greed.
Since when has making 1.9 Billion dollars nett profit in a little over 12 weeks been a legitimate excuse to cut the salaries of hundreds of thousands of people world wide? I would suggest never in a million years, Mark Hurd has revealed his true colors with this one.
First we need to put Mark Hurd’s 20% salary cut into perspective, remember he is only taking a cut to his base salary ($1,450,000) which amounts to a $290,000 drop. Seems quite reasonable until you examine the following, publicly available, information.
* Mark Hurd’s total compensation in 2008 was $42,514,524
* His compensation in fiscal year 2007 was $25,253,461 - so, by my calculations a 68% increase in the total package from 2007 to 2008.
* He also exercised $10 million worth of stock options and had $15.7 million worth of HP stock vest during the 2008 period
* His compensation package includes approximately $738,000 worth of additional compensation;
* Personal and home security - $256,000
* Personal use of HP’s corporate jet - $135,734 (you have to love that don’t you?)
* $71,000 in mortgage subsidy he is guaranteed for relocation expenses under his employment agreement.
So, the question is; what’s the significance of his stated 20% cut in base salary? I would suggest next to nothing.
6 people at the top of the HP pyramid accounted for $142,774,325 in compensation in 2008 alone. That is an obscene amount of money.
It's time to stand up and say enough is enough.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
