Four years after making headlines for cutting his million-dollar salary to provide his employees with at least a $70,000-a-year paycheck, the CEO of a credit card processing company announced Tuesday that he is doing it again.
Dan Price, the head of Seattle-based Gravity Payments, said office employees of the company’s new office in Boise, Idaho — which it acquired three years ago — will all have the same $70,000 salary by 2024.
“This morning we cut the ribbon on the new @GravityPymts Boise office AND announced that all of our employees here will start earning our $70k min salary,” Mr. Price announced on Twitter. “I’m so grateful to work with this amazing team and to be able to compensate them for the value they bring to our community.”
Before Mr. Price’s announced hike, employees at the company were making less than $30,000 a year.
Mr. Price made headlines in 2015 after he announced he would be cutting his million-dollar salary by almost 90% after reading that additional income of up to $75,000 can provide better emotional well-being.
The new salaries doubled 30 employees’ pay and provided another 40 with large raises.
Mr. Price told The New York Times three months after his 2015 announcement that he was “working as hard as I ever worked to make it work” and said some “most valued” employees quit because of the little raises they got when compared to newer employees hikes.
However, Mr. Price touted the raise hike for providing improvements in the lives of his employees three years later, touting that employees’ families have grown, 401(k) contributions have doubled, and much of their debt has been paid off.
“A lot of people said giving up a million dollar per year salary was an unreasonable sacrifice to pay a living wage,” he tweeted. “It was worth it. I am proof of that. Any business making over a million in profit, any CEO making over a million should do it. It’s time.”
• Bailey Vogt can be reached at bvogt@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.