Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has once again highlighted his unconventional approach to compensation during his time as chief executive, saying he deliberately refused stock grants and bonuses despite leading one of the world’s most valuable companies.
Speaking at the 2024 New York Times DealBook Summit, Bezos revealed that he had specifically asked the Amazon board not to give him any additional compensation. He explained that his substantial ownership stake in the company already aligned his interests with long-term growth and made further incentives unnecessary. “I already owned a significant amount of the company, and I just didn’t feel good about taking more. I just felt how could I possibly need more incentive?” he said. Bezos reportedly drew a salary of only $80,000 annually throughout his tenure as CEO.
Bezos described his stance as typical of founder-operators, who often prefer to tie their fortunes to the value of their existing equity rather than through executive pay packages. He stressed that increasing shareholder value was the real measure of success. “I just would have felt icky about it. And I’m actually very proud of that decision,” he added.
He also suggested a different way of measuring wealth and success, one that looks at how much value a leader creates for others rather than just their personal net worth. “Somebody needs to make a list where they rank people by how much wealth they’ve created for other people. Amazon’s market cap is $2.3 trillion today. I’ve created something like $2.1 trillion of wealth for other people,” he said, proposing what he called a “better list” than Forbes.
Other CEOs with 'low' salaries
Bezos is not alone in adopting a symbolic or minimal salary. The approach has become something of a trend in Silicon Valley, where several high-profile leaders have made similar choices. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, for instance, has drawn just $1 annually as his salary since 2013, following the path once taken by Apple co-founder Steve Jobs. Warren Buffett, chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, has also famously limited his compensation to $100,000 per year, without stock-based bonuses, for decades.
These choices are often framed as a statement of principle, signalling that leadership is about value creation and long-term vision rather than personal enrichment. For Bezos, his decision appears to be both a point of pride and a reflection of how he sees the role of a founder in building enduring wealth—not for himself, but for millions of others tied to Amazon’s success.
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