Report calls out MGM, Caesars CEOs for ‘excess’ pay

Caesars CEO Thomas Reeg, left, and MGM CEO Wiliam Hornbuckle. (Corporate publicity photos)

Two Nevada gaming giants are featured in a new report calling out excessive CEO pay at large corporations.

The “ Executive Excess ” report from the Institute for Policy Studies and Inequality.org analyzed what the organizations have deemed the “Low-Wage 100” — the S&P 500 corporations with the lowest median wages. Combined, these companies last year paid their CEOs on average 538 times what they paid a typical worker, meaning for every $1 earned by a rank-and-file worker, the CEO received $538.

“All employees contribute to corporate profits, but too many of our country’s top-tier corporations are doing a spectacularly poor job of sharing the rewards,” reads the report, which noted the average CEO-to-worker ratio for all S&P 500 corporations last year was 268 to 1.

Caesars Entertainment reported a CEO-worker pay ratio of 560 to 1. CEO Thomas Reeg was compensated $18.6 million while median pay for workers was $33,250.

MGM Resorts International reported a CEO-worker pay ratio of 374 to 1. CEO William Hornbuckle made $17 million while median pay for workers was $45,502.

Las Vegas Sands, which no longer operates gaming properties on the Strip but is still headquartered in Nevada, also made the Low Wage 100 list. CEO Robert Goldstein made $21.9 million in 2023 while the median worker made $41,185.

For comparison, the largest gap between CEO and median worker pay was Nike, where CEO, John Donahoe II made 975 times more than the average worker — $32.8 million compared to $33,646.

Gaming CEOS are no stranger to criticism for their high pay. A separate report from last year by the shareholder advocacy group As You Sow listed Reeg and Goldstein as among the most overpaid CEOs . That analysis looked at CEO-worker ratios but also shareholder returns and votes against CEO pay packages.

The Institute for Policy Studies report found that all but seven companies used some of their profits over the past five years for stock buybacks, and nearly half spent more on buybacks than on capital improvements.

Stock buybacks are “​​a once illegal financial maneuver that allows corporate executives to create huge short-term windfalls for themselves and shareholders at the expense of workers and long-term productive investments,” the report argues.

Caesars was one of the seven companies that did not partake in the practice between 2019 and 2023, but MGM did. MGM spent $8.2 billion in stock buybacks between 2019 and 2023.

The Institute for Policy Studies report also highlighted possible policy reforms, including “taxing and restricting stock buybacks, subjecting corporations with excessive levels of CEO pay to higher tax levies, and using federal contracts and subsidies to discourage wide corporate pay gaps.”

The full report and its recommendations are available online .