The CEOs of some of the largest employers with the lowest-paid workers in the US are more “focused on their own personal short-term windfall” – spending significantly more money on stock buybacks than capital investments and contributions to employee retirement plans, according to a new report released by the Institute for Policy Studies.
Between 2019 to 2023, the 100 largest low-wage employers in the US, the 100 corporations in the S&P 500 with the lowest median worker pay, spent $522bn on stock buybacks. Lowe’s and Home Depot spent the most on stock buybacks, with Lowe’s spending $42.6bn during this period and Home Depot spending $37.2bn.
The report cites that Lowe’s could have used those funds to give every one of its 285,000 employees an annual $29,865 bonus for five years, and Home Depot could have used those funds to give five annual $16,071 bonuses to each of the retailer’s 463,100 employees.
I mean, file this under “duh!” but I also recognize that having hard numbers to demonstrate what we already know is a necessary first step to addressing it.
Because when you already make 10,000x more than the lowest paid workers, you really need that extra income.
I mean honestly, 175 MILLION is not enough, if I don’t have at least 15 BILLION am I even a real CEO
And any talk of raising wages is unconstitutional, and communist.
Come on now. Do you really want to work for a corporation where the CEO makes less than his competitors? I mean how embarrassing.
It’s even worse considering that if a CEO even thinks of raising wages, talking to the union, etc, they’ll be fired by the board of directors if their company has one. (Context: the CEO of Starbucks just so happened to be fired for unknown reasons after actually talking to their union.)
Alternately: CEOs with interest in short term profits tend to exploit underpaid workers.
In other news, water is wet.
Water isn’t wet though
No shit! Eat the rich
Those CEOs are starting to look delicious
I wonder if there’s any correlation to PAC contributions.
Institute for Policy Studies - News Source Context (Click to view Full Report)
Information for Institute for Policy Studies:
MBFC: Left - Credibility: Medium - Factual Reporting: Mostly Factual - United States of America
Wikipedia about this sourceThe Guardian - News Source Context (Click to view Full Report)
Information for The Guardian:
MBFC: Left-Center - Credibility: Medium - Factual Reporting: Mixed - United Kingdom
Wikipedia about this sourceWhat do you expect? Greed is our culture’s only practiced core value.
Aside from watching our kids shoot eachother, but that’s more national pastime than value.
Take pride in this cesspool built by slaves on top of a genocide that thrives on and exports exploitation for profit? Fucking never.
In other news, water is wet. Glad we have data to back this up but is anyone really surprised?
I love how many studies and reports need to be done for these people to figure out that the shit everyone’s been saying for years is, in fact, a problem.
…The Guardian has noticed.
cant wait to read all the “water is wet” comments on this post. love seeing that comment every time it gets posted
Well, voting hasn’t worked to curb these issues and government has been inept at doing much beyond fines. Our option then is really just to murder them all. I am not going to spearhead that. Are you? Would love your solutions since you are sick of the action we can take.
?
commenting “water is wet” is not political action. it’s a tired joke.
Cool. So I provided examples of things can be done, tried, and didn’t move the needle.
What’s your plan? We make tired jokes because things that get tried don’t work so that’s how many cope with shittiness.
Time to stop working for these…
This just in: “CEOs work for money… JUST LIKE THE REST OF US!”
