Les Moonves' Big Haul: Bumps Salary To $37M While CBS Ratings, Stock Price Flounder

With all the hubbub around CBS News of late — speculation over whether Katie Couric will resign the anchor's chair before her contract expires, rumors that they are considering outsourcing some of their newsgathering operations to CNN — it's easy to forget that the network as a whole is sinking fast.

The New York Times' Brian Stelter reports on the troubles at CBS:

More perplexing is the prime-time schedule, where no new hit has emerged this year, and as a result, CBS is likely to lose the crown of most-watched network to the Fox network.

And there are concerns over other parts of the CBS Corporation. The radio division is lagging. Pressure to make a digital acquisition is intensifying. Advertising revenue is softening. The good news includes the CBS billboard business, which seems to be doing pretty well.

The challenges facing the company fall squarely on the shoulders of Mr. Moonves, chief executive of CBS since 2004, a year before it was spun off from Viacom. Without the cushion of Viacom's other properties, CBS has been more exposed to the struggles of the advertising market. In 2007, it earned $1.25 billion, down from $1.66 billion the year before. CBS stock closed at $21.40 on Friday, compared with $30.99 a year earlier.

It should come as something of a surprise, then, that CBS Chief Executive Les Moonves (the man who lured Couric to CBS) has awarded himself a raise. Several outlets, including Variety, Silicon Alley Insider, and the Wall Street Journal, report that Moonves gave himself a 29% raise in 2007, giving him a salary of $37 million. What's more, Moonves actually gets some of his taxes paid for by CBS.

Comments

[Manx]

A month or so ago, Les Moonves said that he was perfectly happy with Katie Couric and CBS' third position in the ratings. Why would a complacent executive who is satisfied with failure get a raise?
No wonder CBS stock has been sinking.

[peacehappens]

It has become the American way. These people claim that unions and paying for health benefits cut into their profits but pay no attention to that man behind the curtain over there with the piles of money beside him.

too bad for us

[gulopartisan]

Mr Moonves is making $17,788.46/hour. More than my sister made in a year waiting tables.
He's making $142,307.69/day, nearly triple what the average American family makes in a year.

On the other hand, he's making $296/minute, which is a bit less than week's gross at minimum wage. And he's only making $4.95/second, so let's cut him some slack, 'eh?

[msfiskvletterman]

4/14/08
4:33pm
Alexandria, VA

But Moonves is so good at what he does.

[MicahD]

Ahhhhh! The world is making me sick!

[gorgol]

What in hell do these people do with that kind of money??...and its never enough. Hedge Fund managers get "billions" in bonuses...for what?? how many mansions can you need???...

[ObamaEdwards]

I just read some of the garbage that passes for news at CBS. They posted a story in which they called Obama supporters Naive Democrats, and posited that Clinton is "holding back" the "truth" about how Obama will fail. I am not at all sorry to see this once proud news agency go under. They lost their credibility a long, long time ago.

[ObamaEdwards]

Did we learn nothing from Enron? The CEO's pay increase alone ought to tell stockholders this network is about to bust. The top dogs are trying to get out with as much cash as possible.

[michie62]

what a jerk! He gets a f***ing raise, while WCCO Minneapolis was instructed to fire the best weatherman in the United States, Paul Douglas. They wanted Douglas to stay til the end of May to save their face, but the man said nope, all done. He felt bad about not being able to say goodbye on the station to us, his loyal viewers. The other news outlets in Minneapolis MN offered him a chance to do so. Class act, he did so in his weather journal in the Star Tribune. He appears on the mpls-st. paul pbs news show almanac occassionally and still will. He said his thanks to us on that program last Friday night. And of course Julie Chen is married to Moonv es. She gets big money for that stupid big brother house show and also whatever that rich suit gives her. And she is not that good of a host and was a poor reporter. But when you marry the boss........ WCCO also fired John Reger, a long time weekend anchor and reporter after a noon broadcast and told him to have his stuff and himself out of the building by 5pm. CBS shame on you! I think David Letterman should call Moonves up and shame him about his gd raise! After all Letterman was a weatherman too.

[wm1066]

I liked John Reger, too bad. Paul Douglas wont go hungry he has his Doppler business. Les Moonves is a corporate raider, its a shame the affiliates are being destroyed by his greed.
And I think that Julie Chen is a souless queen, can't hit the channel fast enough when she comes on.

[michie62]

No Paul won't go hungry, and he does massive amounts for charity--particularily suicide awareness. He is a class act and so is Reger, who starred as Karen Carpenter's husband in The Karen Carpenter Story. According to Sunday's Star Tribune, he is out in LA auditioning. Our loss in MN is their gain. Although we may get to see him as his family of origin is all in the Twin Cities. And yes Julie Chen is a souless queen. So is her sister, the other Chen who works for cbs.

[vandegrasse]

Corporate leaders and politicians are the only ones I can think of who are rewarded for their incompetence, in a big way. What idiots we Americans have become. In the old days (before Reagan and his pack of wolves got in) he would have been out on his ass!

[LivingStardust]

Time for your overpaid and under-skilled butt to be hitting the bricks, Les. Especially since you are a hack who was upstaged by the talent when Letterman did an end run around all the other network and studio tools in suits to bypass the writer's strike. Dave is far better qualified to run CBS than you. Why? Because he's not a venal talentless pig. He treats his people WELL. You should learn a lesson or two from him.

[ronspri]

The Hannity/Limbaugh/Coulter cult will insist, Of course he earned it no matter how greedy it seems. He deserves those tax breaks! Meanwhile the poor and middle class should just pull their bootstrings.

[RGKahn]

Another example of inverse ratio of CEO profits to earning ratio. The worse a corporation does the higher the financial remuneration the CEO gets. I guess he wants to get his before the stockholders get theirs.

[oceanlover]

Don't you just love how suits like Les Moonves can send a news organization down the toilet, then give themselves obscene raises, (with the blessings of Sumner Redstone let us not ignore,) all the while acting as though everything is coming up roses for CBS? Wake up call to Moonves and Redstone. CBS can not reinvent history/the truth. Moonves was the idiot who courted and hired Couric in the first place, choosing to pay her millions upon millions, instead of hiring first rate producers and reporters with that money; journalists who might actually have made a difference for CBS's news division. Couric has done precious little other than drive viewers away. The problem is, Moonves is a failed actor, (in part,) and just doesn't have that fire in his belly/passion that is required for serious/hard driving news executives. Past is prologue. He's just not the sort of executive journalists want running a news division. The results are there for all to see.