CEO who set firm’s minimum wage at $70000 hits hard times

Gravity Payments CEO Dan Price’s uber generous act of slashing his $1 million pay drastically and paying a minimum ,000 a year salary to his 120 employees seemed like a win-win situation when he announced it in April.

In today’s lengthy piece in The New York Times – which includes comments from Price’s father, venture capitalist and minimum wage activist Nick Hanauer, customers and several current and former Gravity Payments employees – Dan Price addresses the rift with his brother, as well as the fallout from making the decision to boost employees wages. “I’m renting out my house right now to try and make ends meet myself”.

“He gave raises to people who have the least skills and are the least equipped to do the job, and the ones who were taking on the most didn’t get much of a bump”, said the 26-year-old, who helped Mr Price do the sums on whether Gravity Payments could afford the move in the first place.

Dan Price, 31, told the New York Times that things have gotten so bad he’s been forced to rent out his house.

McMaster, 26, who has quit the company, said Price treated her as if she was being selfish when she told him of her concerns with the wage changes.

“The people who were just clocking in and out were making the same as me”, he told the paper.

Self-doubts have also crept into the employees who stayed, with some saying they felt the increased pressure at work as they questioned if they really deserved the raise. Price just hopes he can hang on until that time.

A SEATTLE boss who famously slashed his own pay to boost the salaries of his workers is now struggling to make ends meet.

The company has generated business from dozens of other clients that were inspired by the plan, but won’t reap the benefits of the new business until at least next year.

Then potentially the worst blow of all: Less than two weeks after the announcement, Mr. Price’s older brother and Gravity co-founder, Lucas Price, citing longstanding differences, filed a lawsuit that potentially threatened the company’s very existence.

With most of his own paycheck and last year’s $2.2 million in profits being shoveled into the salary increased, Dan Price said, “We don’t have a margin of error to pay those legal fees”, The Times reported.