[orionsbelt]

1. Elon could quit and do zero work and he would still own the 12%. So what is his compensation for the extra work?

2. If you owned $10M worth of shares of TSLA from your personal investments, and applied to work at TSLA, would it be reasonable to deny you any compensation since you are already incentivized and share in the success?

This is not to comment on what the right pay package is; perhaps the proposed one is far far too rich, but that's a separate question to whether his existing assets are compensation or not.

[Veserv]

1. 12% of the increased profits. If we used your logic then we would conclude that 100% owners of businesses are not being compensated for their work. They are literally being compensated all of the profit and asset growth.

2. Yes, it is fairly common to “compensate” executives primarily in the form of their own stock appreciation [1]. Mark Zuckerberg receives 1$ in salary, options, stock awards, with only a tiny 20 M$ as reimbursements to avoid running afoul of tax law [2]. Larry Ellison [3] got only 8 M$. Michael Dell only got 3 M$ [4]. Andrew Jassy only 1 M$ [5]. Should I keep going?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-dollar_salary

[2] https://www.salary.com/research/executive-compensation/mark-...

[3] https://www.salary.com/research/executive-compensation/lawre...

[4] https://www.salary.com/research/executive-compensation/micha...

[5] https://www.salary.com/research/executive-compensation/andre...

[orionsbelt]

Your links are misleading:

- Jassy: "When Jassy became CEO in 2021, he received a special stock award with a total value of $212 million. This award vests over 10 years..." - Ellison: "Founder, chairman and CTO Larry Ellison was awarded $138.6 million in the year ended 31 May 2022...However the bulk of the headline-grabbing figures, some $129.3 million of the total awards for both the CTO and CEO, will not be realized for a further three years. The performance-based stock options (PSOs) were granted in May 2018 and were supposed to vest in May 2022 "at the earliest" but were expected to take five years."

Zuckerberg may have agreed to forego additional equity comp, but he is a rare exception. Most executives receive new equity grants, subject to vesting, as compensation, even if they already own a lot of stock, as the stock they already own is not compensation for work.