The annual median income of a single, full time worker in the USA is around USD 60,000, according the country's Labour Bureau data, reports CNBC.But to live comfortably in any of the expensive states like Massachusetts, Hawaii, California, New York or Washington, a single person will have to earn nearly double the median income. And the US's national median for comfortable living (of a single person) is annually USD 89,461. 'Comfortable' living is defined as the monthly income required to cover the 50/30/20 budget. Which means 50 per cent of the monthly income is allocated for housing and utility costs, 30 per cent for discretionary spending and 20 per cent for savings or investments.
However, this estimate for comfortable living in the US states is not for any comparison with the cost of comfortable living in Bangladesh. in fact, with an average monthly salary of BDT 26,000 which is equivalent to USD 218.46 (according to current USD-BDT exchange rate at 1 USD=119 BDT), such comparison is pointless. And what is comfortable living with such average salary for an average Bangladeshi person is yet to be defined. The point at issue here is that if a person earning less than USD90,000 a year can live comfortably anywhere in the USA, what kind of a life would it be for a person who earns USD56 billion a year?The word comfortable will not be enough to describe such a person's life. In fact, such mindboggling sum of money has been suggested as the compensation package by the management of tech company, Tesla for its CEO, Elon Musk. However, questions have been raised by some of the company shareholders about the suggested pay package for Musk. Earlier, the electrical vehicle (EV) company, Tesla's board of directors asked the company's shareholders to vote for a record-breaking compensation package for Musk amounting USD56 billion. However, last January,a Delaware court rejected the deal following a company shareholder's complaint that Musk dictated the terms of the pay deal and that the company board was not sufficiently independent. In her observation, the US judge, KathaleenMcCormick, described the compensation package amount as 'an unfathomable sum'. And the proxy advisory firm, Glass Lewis, last Saturday, also urged Tesla shareholders to reject the USD56 billion pay package for the company's CEO.
Whatever the outcome of the legal battle overthe proposed pay package, which is the highest ever in US history for a top corporate executive, it provides us with an opportunity to see what the corporate bosses of that country earn. How big is the amount asked by Elon Musk? The highest amount of forex reserve that Bangladesh once took pride in was USD 48 billion. That amount is way below Musk's pay deal of USD56 billion. The amount is bigger than Sudan's GDP at USD51.66 billion! What is the last word in affluence in today's world? However, all the CEOs of top corporate houses of USA do not earn such staggering sums of money. Even so, we may have a peek at some of their pay packages. Tim Cook, CEO of Apple, the biggest corporate house in the USA, for instance, earned USD62 million last year as his total compensation. However, his annual base salary remained at USD3 million since 2016.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, on the other hand, had last year a total compensation package of USD48.5 million. Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, a tech giant, in the company's current fiscal year that ended in January, received USD34.2 million as total pay. Mark Zuckerberg, the Meta CEO, in 2023 got USD24.4 million. Notably, since 2013, Zuckerberg has been taking only USD 1 as base salary. Alphabet CEO, Sundar Pichai's pay package for 2023 was USD8.8 million. Amazon CEO, Andy Jessy's compensation for 2023 was USD1.3 million.
Now imagine that Tesla CEO, Musk, gets his pound of flesh. Will then other CEO's of big corporate houses remain happy with the annual pay packages they are receiving now? What will be the definition of affluence then?
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