30 CEOs That Live In Luxury But Refuse To Give Raises To The Employees Because They “Can’t Afford It”
Negotiating a raise is a delicate subject, isn't it? Almost everyone has experienced how tense the atmosphere gets when you initiate a conversation about your salary with your boss. Of course, some corporations genuinely care about their workers' motivation and happiness, yet there still are quite a few that choose to ignore their employees' needs.
Several days ago, Redditor Wageslave823 made a post about how their request for a higher salary was quickly denied. The CEO said the company simply "can’t afford it" but at the same time, he showed no intention of making sacrifices himself to help out the struggling business.
Apparently, this situation seems to be common since the thread received a deluge of comments where many people shared similar experiences. We have selected the most illuminating responses that prove some bosses are way out-of-touch and believe their luxurious life choices are more valuable than their employees. Read on to see what we mean.
A worker recently shared how they were denied a raise because the company "can’t afford it" while the CEO had no intention of making any big sacrifices himself
Image credits: Hunters Race (not the actual photo)
Image credits: Wageslave823
The thread inspired others to chime in with similar stories
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"When it comes to asking for a raise, it's crucial to define a value one is adding to the company, the reasons for a raise (inflation, extra responsibilities, is it a competitive salary within an industry), and be able to communicate this," Evelina Vilke, a career coach, job search strategist, and personal branding expert, told Bored Panda.
She explained that "lack of willingness to address employees' requests and have discussions around pay rise from senior management demotivates staff and potentially can create a toxic working environment."
When company owners and CEOs rarely put in the effort to understand their staff's wants and needs, it leads to passive, unhappy, and even resentful workers. "One of the reasons why people want to change jobs is to get a pay rise," Vilke added.
"Sadly, it's still much easier to secure a new role with a significantly higher salary than to get the same pay rise at the organization where a person worked for an extensive period of time. Hopefully, leadership training programs will change this, and more CEOs will understand that employees are the ones that make their company a success."
A recent Pew Research Center survey only proves Vilke’s points. As it turns out, some of the reasons why Americans decided to walk away from their jobs last year were low pay, lack of opportunities for advancement, and feeling disrespected at work. In fact, seeking a higher salary was such a strong motive, 63% of respondents pointed it out as a top cause for why they left their position.
Yeah they say, if you don't like it, start your own business. I did. Thing is, I'm not coming from money and contacts. You can only do so much without these "network cables". At the very least, I have more control. But down to it all, there are still "bosses" to answer to. More often than not, these people come from old money which you cannot compete with no matter how hard you work.
Yeah, 'appreciation meals' while being paid less always feels like a slap in the face.
Especially when the meals are from the owner's son's crappy restaurant that is failing.
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Anonymous surveys are not anonymous. My friend's husband didn't send one in and they hounded him with email reminders -- with his name on them.
Those are trinkets you give children. Adults have bills and other obligations. The meals and other perks are red flags to me. Every company I've worked for that gives these perks treat you like a child in many ways. Even in leadership roles. I want personal and work separate. I'm an adult would rather have the money to choose the meal or other "gift" to give myself after the necessities are taken care of.
I'm so over all that. If you appreciate me show me the money. Keep all that other nonsense.
I'm so sorry that you have go through this that is not right. It like they are through it under the rug. An yeah some people are so snobbish they don't know how to talk to people they aways think there better or they never been or don't understand how some things are for the poorer class of people
Don't you know it's against those godawful unwritten rules of how to engage at work? It's "unprofessional" to actually mention money, or discuss pay with coworkers. Gotta play the mental labyrinth of jargon and eating s**t long enough to maybe..... get fired once you're past your peak.
Are you a veterinary technician? I'm am and the treatment is quite the same wherever you go
I am. I worked one place for 1.5 years and then suddenly changed practice managers. She started making a big deal out of buying us lunch on bdays, getting us swag from drug reps, and then started a hunger games style competition for sick days to whoever could upsell the most blood work. I quit a couple weeks later. I make $4 an hour more now than I did then.
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Don't offer to feed me, lead me to a better stream. I'll feed myself.
The only thing in my book that translates to " appreciated " is a RAISE. One job I had , the culture at annual review was to find EVERY LITTLE THING to demerit and devalue your performance, translating into "well we can't give you a raise based on your performance." My new job? Performance is at 100% . ONE HUNDRED. My productivity at new job? 149%. NOT A TYPO. ONE HUNDRED FORTY-NINE PCT. To the tune of, they want to know if I can teach other employees. But I'm not about to divulge all that I do- some perhaps, but I'm not gonna hold anyone's hand how to hold down a job. They'll have to figure it out, if they care.
PS I'm not doing anything different than I ever did.
Load More Replies... Ah yes, excellent. I won't be starving until I get home. Thanks I guess.
I hope you've found a better job. The best thing about working in the medical field (this is snark) is there are always sick people. I've worked for some a$$hole dr's who feel like giving you a raise is close to knighting you, and other dr's who give you what you deserve PLUS lunches and coffee!!
If you do work for two doctors then you should just apply somewhere else and get yourself a 10 or $20,000 rate even if you have to move that's the best answer
At the same time, CEOs of the largest firms in the U.S. have seen their pay skyrocket 1,322% since 1978. In contrast, the compensation of the typical worker grew by just 18%. This finding comes from an Economic Policy Institute report, where the authors revealed that CEOs were paid 351 times as much as a common employee in 2020.
"Exorbitant CEO pay is a major contributor to rising inequality that we could safely do away with," the authors of the report, distinguished fellow Lawrence Mishel and research assistant Jori Kandra, wrote. "CEOs are getting more because of their power to set pay and because so much of their pay (more than 80%) is stock-related, not because they are increasing their productivity or possess specific, high-demand skills."
Jumping to other job is never a guilt. You never hurt anyone for advancing your career.
Of course, it would be misleading to say that all chief executives show little care or interest in their staff’s lives. You’ve probably heard of stories like the one where the CEO cut his own pay by 90 percent to increase his employees’ wages.
However, "even though there were cases of CEOs sacrificing their salaries to save jobs and/or give employees a raise during a time of crisis, it's not a very common practice," career coach Evelina Vilke told Bored Panda. "The actions of a CEO speak volumes of a leadership style, internal culture, and how invested a company is in its employees and their wellbeing."
A marketing communications firm Weber Shandwick, in partnership with KRC Research, released a survey of more than 1,700 executives in 19 markets worldwide. They tried to explore how people perceive a CEO's reputation to better understand what is needed of them today. "Executives believe that their own CEO’s reputation contributes to nearly half of both their company’s reputation (45%) and market value (44%)," the researchers wrote.
They can learn just how to lie into employees faces. With pokerface of course...
They also found that executives value humility as one of the few key attributes a leader should have. "Building CEO reputation is not about enhancing egos or celebrity," they stated in the report. "Humility is now the new green among chief executives, possibly because they’ve all experienced their 15 minutes of shame in addition to their 15 minutes of fame in this tell-all world."
However, only two in ten executives (22%) describe their CEOs as humble. Since humility is an effective CEO characteristic, we can only hope that there will be an increased number of bosses who can understand, empower, and support those around them.
It's a normal theme since the days where the rich Lord lives in the castle and the serfs live in their mud hovels. People generally see business owners with authority and wealth like some kind of deity.
This isn't always true. Sometimes a business truly can't. Businesses fail all the time. However, that doesn't mean an employee should accept less than the market rate for their labor. No matter what they say, the vast majority of businesses do not value their employees as people. They are buying labor. We are selling labor. It is a market. Don't believe anything they say about being a family, or loyalty, or sacrifice. That's just them trying to manipulate you. They'll fire you in a heartbeat if it makes financial sense to them. You don't owe them any better than that.
That’s either an incredible amount of gall or the dictionary definition of ‘oblivious’. I’m not sure which is worse.
Note: this post originally had 35 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
My boss obviously makes more money than me but not an obcene amount more. He lives in a normal townhouse (like me), drives a normal car (like me), and goes on normal holidays (like me). Welcome to the socialist hellhole that is Norway! 🤗
Uhh I'm like that too. I live in the same type of apartment everyone lives in. Normal car, normal meals. A business owner does not always mean rich. I didn't come from money and connections. Just an ordinary broke.
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Can we make it law that wages HAVE to rise with inflation? Also if management gets a raise, matching the managements percentage.
There should be a law in usa and canada that say at least 50% of profits for a private company and 100% for everything own by the gouvernement, have to go back into the company as raises, better equipement, renovations, employees well being or whatever else is needed. Not normal that they raise the price of food because of everything that's happened but the owner makes record profits...should be illegal to do that on essential products like food, if you raise the price the profits can't be higher than before
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I asked for a raise and they said no. A few days later they purchased a € 145 million property. I guess they were saving up for that hahahah
That's why so many workers quit their jobs in USA now! Toxic work environments, shitty paid jobs, exploitation, bad management, no worker rights. Good companies with fair salary, fair work load and good environment can get happy useful staff. Forget about all that loyalty BS, neither workers nor companies need that crap.
This is why ppl are saying we should eat the wealthy, Robespierre would have blown his head over this. Most ppl are just scraping by and the wealthy think that not buying 6 Maserati just two in one year is the end of the world while their workers die from starvation. We absolutely should eat the rich, they f-ed up everything and they are not just unapologetic about it but they carry themselves like it's their birthright or privilege. In the meantime they look down on the ppl that actually make their money with disgust, because they think of those ppl as dirty or unsavory, which is funny since they are the one that pay so little that they have to make sacrifices in things where ppl should absolutely not make sacrifices. This won't change, their next generation will be even more greedy, even more dumb, and they soon they dehumanize their workers to the level of slaves or property. Time to re-assigne the generational wealth! We don't need billionaires, not to mention multi-billionaires. The ppls only hope is that s**t will arrive with such a force that it will wake up the masses and ppl finally realize that they are getting the short end of the stick.
Worked for a printing company about 20 years ago, where the owner constantly complained to the head pressman his trials and tribulations about costs he had to deal with. This is a guy who paid for private school for his two daughters, taxes and upkeep on two triple deckers (3 family houses) in Boston, vacation home in Vermont, two massive SUVs. Meanwhile, the head pressman was raising 5 kids in the projects (council housing), public school for the kids and vacations at home. Raises? Christmas bonus? Well, we have to cut back on those, don't we?
I prepared a whole spiel about why I deserved a raise … the engineering manager said, “with an engagement ring like that, what do you need a raise for?” 😒
My old employers couldn't afford to employ more people and forced us to struggle with inadequate room to work, lack of basic resources, below the norm wages, horrendous fees. But they COULD afford 5 cars for 2 people), multiple international holidays, private boarding schools, exclusive training and activities for their kids who they rarely saw, and 11 houses.
worked at a company, they were far from broke but got forbid I needed any office supplies, only order one sharpie at a time, even a calculator, no gave me a broken one. bought my own and put my name on everything because I had to purchase it myself.
My old boss/owner was significantly underpaying everyone on staff. After a year or two, I told him to his face that he was underpaying everyone, and what the market rate was for someone in our positions and with our experience. He told me I was making up the numbers and lying to him. A few weeks later, I had a new job with a 175% raise (almost 3x the salary)
My boss was told by his boss to layoff some people. He said no and took a pay cut, along with several other members of upper management. They never said anything until we were able to start hiring again.
A year late but…company pulled us off of salary just weeks before a $5k yearly increase and then gave us all 2% raises. They said they couldn’t afford any more. CEO turns up in an $80k Jeep and was overheard in his office by multiple others talking about his upper level penthouse he just bought in a new high rise in Denver. He’s doing this while most of my coworkers have only seen $3 increases to their pay across the last 3 years but saw their rent go up $300 a month. Eat the rich.
Worked as an office manager. Receptionist asked for a raise. Bosses said no can't give $1/hr won't give anything. Receptionist quit. Bosses yelled at me for not telling them she was unhappy. I let them know that asking for a raise after over a year and being told no was her "I'm unhappy".
I worked for a company owned by Warren Buffett and had worked there for 4 years. I have a degree in Architecture and drove 35 miles one way to work. In the 4 years I worked there, I went from 11.50 an hr to under 13.00 an hr. 4 years at a company owned by a billionaire. I said this isn't worth it. Now I work for a company and make 36.00 an hour because I'm worth it.
If you can't afford to pay your employees a decent wage your business is failing!!!
If y'all ain't gonna name names, then stfu. Waste of a post with NOTHING changing
I would love to quit my job and get a better one. I live in the middle of a national forest. The other decent sized areas are at least 30 minutes away. They offer jobs with a little better pay. The best jobs are 45 minutes away. I’m trying to relocate where I can actually make some money
As an RN, imagine making $30/hr while the hospital pays the traveling nurse next to you $100/hr. We're both doing the same work and have worked during the entire pandemic!! Why does the hospital have travelers? 1- vaccine mandate 2- nurses left in order to travel to get $$$. So the staff that didn't leave is stuck working short staffed, with more responsibities due to the lack of staff. While also dealing with difficult patients and families who don't care about any of that. What's our incentive... a pizza party and a one time $1000 bonus spread over 6 months. So much for being considered essential, especially when I know the government gave millions to hopitals across the entire country.
Happens every day - been on both sides; they're willing to go without sick time, vacation time, bereavement time, FMLA time, workers comp if they get hurt at work - bc the contract gets canceled when that happens, paying ridiculous amounts out of pocket for decent health benefits, getting stuck with the worst or extra patients, jealous coworkers that don't feel like they should need help bc they're making soo much more, little to No training - generally a day or so vs weeks or months for a typical staff member, having to live out of a hotel room, buying every meal, not seeing family or friends for weeks for months at a time, working in hostile environments and about 50 other things I missed. Not too mention ZERO job security they can be canceled with no notice or pay for a day, or the entire contract bc in a moments notice. Money's great though - self righteous people not so much. Anybody can sacrifice family and friends to do it, most have kids & left for a better future for them!
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What is this "afford" word? Companies pay you what you are worth. Not what they can afford as if extra money lying around is given to employees. I am glad to see more people seeking greener pastures during the great resignation though.
We all have to make sacrifices... In french we have a saying for hypocrisy like this that goes: "on" exclus la personne qui parle -> "we" excludes the person who's talking... I think if fit this post very well
I mean, there are some awful bosses and company cultures (like the OP said), but there are also smaller companies where the business owners have invested their own money and have taken a lot of risk. It's different if they're blowing tens of thousands all the time, but some bosses are taking extra for the first few years because they've invested that and deserve to benefit from it. You wouldn't start a business just to live on the breadline
My boss obviously makes more money than me but not an obcene amount more. He lives in a normal townhouse (like me), drives a normal car (like me), and goes on normal holidays (like me). Welcome to the socialist hellhole that is Norway! 🤗
Uhh I'm like that too. I live in the same type of apartment everyone lives in. Normal car, normal meals. A business owner does not always mean rich. I didn't come from money and connections. Just an ordinary broke.
Load More Replies... Can we make it law that wages HAVE to rise with inflation? Also if management gets a raise, matching the managements percentage.
There should be a law in usa and canada that say at least 50% of profits for a private company and 100% for everything own by the gouvernement, have to go back into the company as raises, better equipement, renovations, employees well being or whatever else is needed. Not normal that they raise the price of food because of everything that's happened but the owner makes record profits...should be illegal to do that on essential products like food, if you raise the price the profits can't be higher than before
Load More Replies... I asked for a raise and they said no. A few days later they purchased a € 145 million property. I guess they were saving up for that hahahah
That's why so many workers quit their jobs in USA now! Toxic work environments, shitty paid jobs, exploitation, bad management, no worker rights. Good companies with fair salary, fair work load and good environment can get happy useful staff. Forget about all that loyalty BS, neither workers nor companies need that crap.
This is why ppl are saying we should eat the wealthy, Robespierre would have blown his head over this. Most ppl are just scraping by and the wealthy think that not buying 6 Maserati just two in one year is the end of the world while their workers die from starvation. We absolutely should eat the rich, they f-ed up everything and they are not just unapologetic about it but they carry themselves like it's their birthright or privilege. In the meantime they look down on the ppl that actually make their money with disgust, because they think of those ppl as dirty or unsavory, which is funny since they are the one that pay so little that they have to make sacrifices in things where ppl should absolutely not make sacrifices. This won't change, their next generation will be even more greedy, even more dumb, and they soon they dehumanize their workers to the level of slaves or property. Time to re-assigne the generational wealth! We don't need billionaires, not to mention multi-billionaires. The ppls only hope is that s**t will arrive with such a force that it will wake up the masses and ppl finally realize that they are getting the short end of the stick.
Worked for a printing company about 20 years ago, where the owner constantly complained to the head pressman his trials and tribulations about costs he had to deal with. This is a guy who paid for private school for his two daughters, taxes and upkeep on two triple deckers (3 family houses) in Boston, vacation home in Vermont, two massive SUVs. Meanwhile, the head pressman was raising 5 kids in the projects (council housing), public school for the kids and vacations at home. Raises? Christmas bonus? Well, we have to cut back on those, don't we?
I prepared a whole spiel about why I deserved a raise … the engineering manager said, “with an engagement ring like that, what do you need a raise for?” 😒
My old employers couldn't afford to employ more people and forced us to struggle with inadequate room to work, lack of basic resources, below the norm wages, horrendous fees. But they COULD afford 5 cars for 2 people), multiple international holidays, private boarding schools, exclusive training and activities for their kids who they rarely saw, and 11 houses.
worked at a company, they were far from broke but got forbid I needed any office supplies, only order one sharpie at a time, even a calculator, no gave me a broken one. bought my own and put my name on everything because I had to purchase it myself.
My old boss/owner was significantly underpaying everyone on staff. After a year or two, I told him to his face that he was underpaying everyone, and what the market rate was for someone in our positions and with our experience. He told me I was making up the numbers and lying to him. A few weeks later, I had a new job with a 175% raise (almost 3x the salary)
My boss was told by his boss to layoff some people. He said no and took a pay cut, along with several other members of upper management. They never said anything until we were able to start hiring again.
A year late but…company pulled us off of salary just weeks before a $5k yearly increase and then gave us all 2% raises. They said they couldn’t afford any more. CEO turns up in an $80k Jeep and was overheard in his office by multiple others talking about his upper level penthouse he just bought in a new high rise in Denver. He’s doing this while most of my coworkers have only seen $3 increases to their pay across the last 3 years but saw their rent go up $300 a month. Eat the rich.
Worked as an office manager. Receptionist asked for a raise. Bosses said no can't give $1/hr won't give anything. Receptionist quit. Bosses yelled at me for not telling them she was unhappy. I let them know that asking for a raise after over a year and being told no was her "I'm unhappy".
I worked for a company owned by Warren Buffett and had worked there for 4 years. I have a degree in Architecture and drove 35 miles one way to work. In the 4 years I worked there, I went from 11.50 an hr to under 13.00 an hr. 4 years at a company owned by a billionaire. I said this isn't worth it. Now I work for a company and make 36.00 an hour because I'm worth it.
If you can't afford to pay your employees a decent wage your business is failing!!!
If y'all ain't gonna name names, then stfu. Waste of a post with NOTHING changing
I would love to quit my job and get a better one. I live in the middle of a national forest. The other decent sized areas are at least 30 minutes away. They offer jobs with a little better pay. The best jobs are 45 minutes away. I’m trying to relocate where I can actually make some money
As an RN, imagine making $30/hr while the hospital pays the traveling nurse next to you $100/hr. We're both doing the same work and have worked during the entire pandemic!! Why does the hospital have travelers? 1- vaccine mandate 2- nurses left in order to travel to get $$$. So the staff that didn't leave is stuck working short staffed, with more responsibities due to the lack of staff. While also dealing with difficult patients and families who don't care about any of that. What's our incentive... a pizza party and a one time $1000 bonus spread over 6 months. So much for being considered essential, especially when I know the government gave millions to hopitals across the entire country.
Happens every day - been on both sides; they're willing to go without sick time, vacation time, bereavement time, FMLA time, workers comp if they get hurt at work - bc the contract gets canceled when that happens, paying ridiculous amounts out of pocket for decent health benefits, getting stuck with the worst or extra patients, jealous coworkers that don't feel like they should need help bc they're making soo much more, little to No training - generally a day or so vs weeks or months for a typical staff member, having to live out of a hotel room, buying every meal, not seeing family or friends for weeks for months at a time, working in hostile environments and about 50 other things I missed. Not too mention ZERO job security they can be canceled with no notice or pay for a day, or the entire contract bc in a moments notice. Money's great though - self righteous people not so much. Anybody can sacrifice family and friends to do it, most have kids & left for a better future for them!
Load More Replies... What is this "afford" word? Companies pay you what you are worth. Not what they can afford as if extra money lying around is given to employees. I am glad to see more people seeking greener pastures during the great resignation though.
We all have to make sacrifices... In french we have a saying for hypocrisy like this that goes: "on" exclus la personne qui parle -> "we" excludes the person who's talking... I think if fit this post very well
I mean, there are some awful bosses and company cultures (like the OP said), but there are also smaller companies where the business owners have invested their own money and have taken a lot of risk. It's different if they're blowing tens of thousands all the time, but some bosses are taking extra for the first few years because they've invested that and deserve to benefit from it. You wouldn't start a business just to live on the breadline
