While Workers Suffered, Railroad CEOs Raked in $200 Million
As a major strike looms, railroad executives have been paid more than $200 million in the last three years — while failing to meet workers’ demands for benefits and time off. They claim their skyrocketing profits do not reflect “any contributions by labor.”
Warren Buffett, chief executive officer of Berkshire Hathaway, the owner of BNSF Railway, at an annual meeting in Omaha, Nebraska, 2010. (Daniel Acker / Bloomberg via Getty Images)
As a major rail strike looms, rail executives have been reluctant to meet workers’ demands for better pay, benefits, and time off. At the same time, the CEOs of five of the largest railroad conglomerates have been paid more than $200 million in the last three years, and company shareholders have been boosted by nearly $200 billion in stock buybacks and dividends over the last dozen years.
A sixth railroad giant is controlled by billionaire Warren Buffett, whose net worth jumped 50 percent during the pandemic to $100.1 billion. Buffett earlier this year bragged to shareholders about huge earnings even after accounting for worker pay.
“Your railroad had record earnings of $6 billion in 2021,” he gushed in his annual letter. “Here, it should be noted, we are talking about the old-fashioned sort of earnings that we favor: a figure calculated after interest, taxes, depreciation, amortization and all forms of compensation.”
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