Live data from Hacker News

Apple chief executive Tim Cook gets $750m payout

bbc.com

271–280 of 360 posts

Re: Apple chief executive Tim Cook gets $750m payout

#271

So according to this 2018 article by The Verge [1], Foxconn workers producing iGadgets in China earn on average $390.16 per month. Times that by twelve and we find that workers earn $4,681.92 per year on average. If we divide Tim's $750,000,000 bonus/payout this year by that $4,681.92 yearly Foxconn salary, we get 160,190 My question is: how is Tim so productive that he does roughly 160,000 people’s work, or 1/8th of…

Ok now do this same exercise with your own salary. In fact, anyone here can. Are you as a software engineer making $200,000+ delivering as much value as ~42 of these Chinese laborers at Foxconn? I doubt it. And people pointing to Tim Cook about how it’s all unfair and everything. Dang I mean the cognitive dissonance and ego to think that you making 42x a worker is ok because the JIRA tickets you addressed add a lot t…

tbh I don‘t. Even compared to people in my country I feel like I‘m not creating much more value than those paid a minimum wage. I rather feel both lucky working in an industry where (too) much money changes hands and a bit guilty, too

Re: Apple chief executive Tim Cook gets $750m payout

#272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When will we learn to stop making these silly calculations about "productivity" and understand that people are paid not by the value of their work, but by their scarcity? Any factory in China can replace most of their 160k employees overnight if they wanted to. How many Tim Cook's do you have lying around?

There’s only one Tim Cook in the world. But, there’s also only one me in the world. CEOs don’t get paid so much because they are personally unique. Every human is globally unique; it’s a consequence of how complex humans are. CEOs have artificial scarcity because of the hierarchical structure of companies. By definition, there’s only one CEO of Apple. Does that mean that ONLY Tim Cook, out of billions of humans, coul…

> CEOs don’t get paid so much because they are personally unique. [...] CEOs have artificial scarcity because of the hierarchical structure of companies.

They get paid proportional to the impact of their decisions, not in proportion to their scarcity, skill, etc.

If Apple must have someone to make decisions every day that could cost the company millions of dollars, what is the correct amount to compensate that person?

And if Apple were instead a $50M market cap company, would that amount change?

CEO compensation is a combination of "someone has to be in the chair" + "how important are our decisions?" + "how much can we afford to pay."

To reach back to the GP's gripe: if 1 (or even 160,000) assembly workers screw up at their job, it has a much lower impact on Apple as a whole.

Re: Apple chief executive Tim Cook gets $750m payout

#273
post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My question is: how is Tim so productive that he does roughly 160,000 people’s work, or 1/8th of Foxconn’s total workforce? [2] /s Nobody has been making these productivity claims to begin with, but leftists commonly use productivity vs salary to ridicule CEO compensation. CEOs are paid for numerous reasons, for example board wants to trust the person with billions worth of assets which makes it sensible to pay cer…

You are justifying someone being paid $750m. No one needs that much money. No one. Why are you defending this? It's obscene. Really reminds me of this https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/002/147/150/e2c...

> You are justifying someone being paid $750m. No one needs that much money. No one. Why are you defending this? It's obscene.

Yeah, he doesn't need it, but I am happy that he has it. He clearly is a guy who can deliver value for society and I don't think he is going to use the money stupidly.

Would I pay someone $750m to run a company? Definitely not. However as a stock owner I would pay using stock compensation, and that's what happened here. The whole idea that the owners are paying in cash is wrong to begin with, as that isn't the case.

Re: Apple chief executive Tim Cook gets $750m payout

#274

So according to this 2018 article by The Verge [1], Foxconn workers producing iGadgets in China earn on average $390.16 per month. Times that by twelve and we find that workers earn $4,681.92 per year on average. If we divide Tim's $750,000,000 bonus/payout this year by that $4,681.92 yearly Foxconn salary, we get 160,190 My question is: how is Tim so productive that he does roughly 160,000 people’s work, or 1/8th of…

When will we learn to stop making these silly calculations about "productivity" and understand that people are paid not by the value of their work, but by their scarcity? Any factory in China can replace most of their 160k employees overnight if they wanted to. How many Tim Cook's do you have lying around?

Not exactly. Tim Cook is not paid by either the value of his work, or his scarcity. He is paid by the EXPECTATION of the value of his work… kind of like how stock markets work.

His pay is an expression of the expectation of a lot of other people. His pay is opinion, not direct value. And you can't pick some random unproven person who may or may not perform as well, and say they are of equivalent OPINION. You could say there's a chance, even a good chance, that they're of equivalent value, but that's a gamble.

This is how weird pay disparities develop. It's not in any way that Tim Cook has personally done things worth that much, or that he's personally pressuring all those in charge of paying him to that extent.

Intentionally or not, the question Tim Cook presents to those with the power to keep or dismiss him is this: How much are you willing to bet that if you lose me, things break and everything sucks?

They are willing to bet $750 million.

That's what happened. How much would you be willing to bet? If it's far less, or if you want to kick Tim out anyway, how many are there of you? Are you heavily outnumbered or are you expressing a common opinion?

Re: Apple chief executive Tim Cook gets $750m payout

#275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When will we learn to stop making these silly calculations about "productivity" and understand that people are paid not by the value of their work, but by their scarcity? Any factory in China can replace most of their 160k employees overnight if they wanted to. How many Tim Cook's do you have lying around?

Not exactly. Tim Cook is not paid by either the value of his work, or his scarcity. He is paid by the EXPECTATION of the value of his work… kind of like how stock markets work. His pay is an expression of the expectation of a lot of other people. His pay is opinion, not direct value. And you can't pick some random unproven person who may or may not perform as well, and say they are of equivalent OPINION. You could sa…

I suppose that's the plot to Trading Places.

Re: Apple chief executive Tim Cook gets $750m payout

#276
post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because you like your current job? Why would someone like Cook start a new business when he can do it within Apple?

Can he turn Apple into a computer company that would focus on replaceable, modular electronics? Something like Fairphone, but on a bigger scale and with more resources, or that could have more runway without turning a profit? No, he can't. Apple is known for being a company that wants to integrate everything and needs to control all of its process. And for all the environmental talk, they would never sacrifice their…

If he did, would he then be worth the 750 million?

Re: Apple chief executive Tim Cook gets $750m payout

#277
post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> by their scarcity By their perceived scarcity Chances are that anyone other than Tim could have done just as well. Still, this is over 10 years, and Apple shares have increased in value by 1900%. If they were still the same value he’d have gotten 40M, for about 4M per year. Which is much more reasonable. I still think it’s high, but in line with what others get.

Because it should be about productivity. People are highlighting a moral failing of society.

This is a poor take. Productivity is meaningless, leverage and impact is everything.

Tim Cook working for one day could easily have a larger impact than most people will have in their entire lives because he has extremely high leverage.

Is it fair? Absolutely not, but life is not fair. I don't understand what moral obligation society should have to base compensation on productivity.

PS: you could argue that Tim Cook is far more productive than everyone else because he produces far more results than everyone else.

Re: Apple chief executive Tim Cook gets $750m payout

#278
post #41

No matter how big is Apple is today, $750m is an obscene amount of money. Don't understand people that can justify that.

If his compensation is tied to the market value of Apple, of course it matters how big Apple is. If it were worth $5 trillion today, his compensation would have been double.

Re: Apple chief executive Tim Cook gets $750m payout

#279

So according to this 2018 article by The Verge [1], Foxconn workers producing iGadgets in China earn on average $390.16 per month. Times that by twelve and we find that workers earn $4,681.92 per year on average. If we divide Tim's $750,000,000 bonus/payout this year by that $4,681.92 yearly Foxconn salary, we get 160,190 My question is: how is Tim so productive that he does roughly 160,000 people’s work, or 1/8th of…

Recipe to have a nonsensical argument: 1. Take a Normal distribution 2. Take 2 pieces of data that are 3 standard deviation from mean, in opposite directions 3. Compare and contrast 4. Keep a straight face while making the argument, use plenty of Logical fallacies to defend your position against logic and reasoning. 5. Alternate between attacking and being the victim. 6. Lather, rinse, repeat

Emotional arguments are more effective than logical ones, even if you are talking to smart people.

Re: Apple chief executive Tim Cook gets $750m payout

#280
post #236

So according to this 2018 article by The Verge [1], Foxconn workers producing iGadgets in China earn on average $390.16 per month. Times that by twelve and we find that workers earn $4,681.92 per year on average. If we divide Tim's $750,000,000 bonus/payout this year by that $4,681.92 yearly Foxconn salary, we get 160,190 My question is: how is Tim so productive that he does roughly 160,000 people’s work, or 1/8th of…

My question is: how is Tim so productive that he does roughly 160,000 people’s work, or 1/8th of Foxconn’s total workforce? [2] /s My question is: if Tim Cook didn't exist, would any of those Foxconn workers have jobs? My other questions is: if you put 160,190 Foxconn workers in front of 160,190 development environments, how long before they would randomly re-create the iPhone? You can't compare salaries, or even val…

I would actually propose that Tim Cook could be worth infinitely more than 160,190 Foxconn workers because they may have never re-created the iPhone.
Post reply on HN