Google boss earns $226 million, fires 12,000 employees

According to the US Securities and Exchange Commission, the Google boss earned Sundar Pichai in the past year $226 million (205 million euros). The majority of this, namely 218 million euros, went in the form of company shares to the 50 year olds.

Like the news agency Reuters writes, Pichai’s salary is with it 800 times greater than the median income in the US group. This is therefore around 280.000 Dollar. So half of Google employees make less than $280,000 and the other half make more.

Layoffs at Alphabet

The Google CEO’s salary was increased just a few months after the immense downsizing in the company public. Google parent Alphabet announced in January that 6 percent their staff or 12,000 employees to dismiss. There have been several protests in recent weeks. Hundreds of Google employees went on strike in London in early April. Protests broke out in Zurich in mid-March after more than 200 employees were laid off.

Alphabet and Google were also part of the austerity program the decline of Good, which are paid to top managers when certain goals are achieved. In view of the Google boss’s high income, however, many employees who have been fired are likely to feel betrayed.

$2 million base salary

Pichai’s bonus is paid out in the form of a share package every 3 years, Google CEO’s base salary is only 2 million dollars. In 2019, his share package was set at $240 million. The difference can probably be attributed to the economically weak past year.

The profit of the Google parent Alphabet in 2022 was “only” around 60 billion dollars and was thus 16 billion less than in 2021. Google shares also lost 39 percent of their value last year. This year it went up at least 19 percent again.

Pichai is probably worth $500 million

Pichai has worked for the search engine giant since 2004 and was responsible for the development of Google Chrome and Google Drive responsible. Later he also led the development of Google Maps. Born in India, he rose to become CEO in 2019, succeeding Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page. The manager’s fortune is based on a half a billion dollars estimated.