Salaries

Forty-eight hours after Albert H. Wiggin admitted to the Senate Banking & Currency Committee last autumn that he was receiving $100,000 per year "retirement pay" from Chase National Bank, President Roosevelt announced he had begun studying legislation to control high salaries by taxation. He had already approved Federal Rail Coordinator Eastman's "suggestion" that railroad presidents fix their income at $60,000 or less. Then, on orders from the Senate, the Federal Trade Commission sent a questionnaire to some 2,000 corporations whose stock is listed on the New York Stock and Curb Exchanges. Resultant information: executive salaries.

The head of the biggest U. S. corporation was by no means the highest paid. President Walter Gifford of American Telephone & Telegraph had his salary cut from $229,167 to $206,250 last March. Highest straight salary for 1932 was $250,000, paid to Charles M. Schwab as board chairman of Bethlehem Steel. President Cornelius Francis Kelley of Anaconda Copper got $249,232 in 1932, against $345,000 in 1929. Eugene Gifford Grace of Bethlehem Steel got a $1,600,000 bonus in 1929 but his $12,000 salary had been upped to $180,000 for 1932. That year George Washington Hill was paid a $120,000 salary and a $705,607 bonus, against salary & bonus of $605,613 in 1929. Another notable bonus increase was Thomas John Watson's, who as president of International Business Machines was paid $258,106 in 1929 and $394,015 in 1932, plus a regular $60,000 salary in both years.

For the first time the U. S. public learned what the editor of its biggest magazine was paid. The salary of Sateve-post's George Horace Lorimer was reduced from $133,399 in 1929 to $118,750 in 1932. Adolph Zukor's bonus as president of Paramount Publix was $757,500 in 1929, plus salary of $130,000. For 1932 he listed salary of $96,031, no bonus. But Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's famed Producer Irving Thalberg, who received $208,000 straight salary in 1929, was still getting $201,000 in 1932--$99,000 less than M-G-M pays Greta Garbo for her 40-week year.

General Aviation, General Motors, Studebaker, American Can questioned the Federal Trade Commission's authority, refused to reply to its questionnaire. Several others, including Allied Chemical & Dye, Delaware & Hudson, American I. G. Chemical, Koppers Gas & Coke, declined to answer on the ground that their business was not interstate.

Other salaries: (B =bonus included)

1929 1932 Jesse L. Lasky 1929 (Paramount Publix) . . .881,500 (B) 113,618 (B)*

H. T. Parson (F. W. Wool worth) . . . 726,957 (B) 637,170 (B)

Alexander Legge (International Harvester) . . . 612,860(B) 66,848 (B)

F. B Rentschler (United Aircraft) . . .420,665 (B) 193,790 (B)

E. L. Cord (Auburn) . . . . . . . . . . . . 387,672 (B) 10,602 (B)

Nicholas M. Schenck (Loew's) . . . . . . . . . . . .362,202 (B) 221,053 (B)

Francois Coty (Coty, Inc.) . . . . . . . . . 310,115 (B) 74,479 (B)

B. L. Patterson (American Machine & Foundry) . . . . . . . 270,980 (B) 143,762 (B)

C. W. Toms (Liggett & Myers) . . . . 270,671 (B) 149,059 (B)

S. S. Kresge (S. S. Kresge). . . . . . 266,675 (B) 18,000

Alvan Macauley (Packard Motor). . . . 356,940(B) 63,458

P. G. Gossler (Columbia Gas & Electric) . . . . . 251,334 (B) 96,561 (B)

R. E. Wood (Sears, Roebuck) . . . . . 250,320 (B) 83,688

Myron C. Taylor (U. S. Steel) . . . . . . . 209,361 (B) 197,203 (B)

David Sarnoff (Radio Corp.) . . . . . . . 208,693 (B) 94,865 (B)

C. M. Chester Jr. (General Foods). . . . . . . 206,324 (B) 70,695 (B)

Charles B. Bohn (Bohn Aluminum & Brass) . . . 203, 157 (B) 61,666

R. C. Holmes (Texas Corp.) . . . . . . 196,400 (B) 88,000

Carl Laemmle (Universal Pictures) . . 181,500 156,000

R. W. Woodruff (Coca-Cola) . . . . . . . 160,000 (B) 120,000

F.B.Patterson (National Cash Register). . . . . . . 124,000 104,000

Jesse I. Straus (R. H. Macy) . . . . . . . . 139,240 (B) 127,002 (B)

W. J. McAneeny (Hudson Motor). . . . . 125,000 97,576

Walter Teagle (Standard of N. J.) . . . 125,000 72,295

F. H. Brownell (American Smelting & Refining) . . . . 123,000 (B) 100,600

H. L. Pratt (Socony-Vacuum) . . . 120,000 126,667

William H. Woodin (American Car & Foundry) . . . . . 100,992 (B) 67,834 (B)

William H. Woodin (American Locomotive) . . . 83,505 (B) 63,652 (B)

Lammot du Pont (E. I. du Pont de Nemours) . . . 100,599 (B) 84,990 (B)

Harvey Firestone (Firestone Tire). . . . . 100,000 64,800

Harry F. Sinclair (Consolidated Oil).. . 80,374 (B) 107,786 (B)

J. H. Rand (Remington Rand).. . 75,500 (B) 68,925 (B)

P. W. Litchfield (Goodyear Tire) ..... 101,000 (B) 79,787 (B)

Sosthenes Behn (Inter national Tel. & Tel.) . . . . . . .74,300 (B) 51,538 (B)

Gerard Swope (General Electric) . . .Not available 73,554

Owen D. Young (General Electric) . . . Not available 73,534

When his secretary read the list aloud to blind Senator Gore, that Oklahoman tapped his way on to the Senate floor to introduce an amendment to the Revenue Bill placing a tax of 80% on all salaries and bonuses over $75,000 per year. Said he: "I have received approval of my program ... in telegrams received from hundreds of stockholders who have received no income . . . while the officers of non-paying corporations lived in luxury on fat salaries and huge bonuses."

Few days later the Federal Reserve Board furnished the Senate a list of salaries paid by banks for the year ending June 1933. Highest was to Henry C. McEldowney of Pittsburgh's Union Trust Co.--$165,000. The next nine were all to executives of Manhattan banks: Winthrop W. Aldrich of Chase National, $151,744; Charles S. McCain of Chase (since resigned), $128,488; Percy Hampton Johnston of Chemical Bank & Trust, $125,000; Harvey Dow Gibson of Manufacturers Trust, $125,000; Gordon S. Rentschler of National City. $125,000; the late Charles Hamilton Sabin of Guaranty Trust, $101,919; President William C. Potter of Guaranty. $101,069; Walter E. Frew of Corn Exchange, $100,000; George W. Davison of Central Hanover. $100,000.

Lowest payment recorded was to Andrew William Mellon's son Paul, no executive: $87.50.

*1931

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