Entertainers make big bucks amusing us.
If you’ve ever seen Judge Judy on TV, you’ve heard her say, “They don’t keep me here ’cause I’m gorgeous, they keep me here ’cause I’m smart!” Judy Sheindlin must be extremely smart to make $47 million annually, which translates into a little more than $900,000 for each of her 52 workdays. Country singing legend Dolly Parton’s annual salary is said to be $37 million. Aaron Rodgers, Green Bay Packers quarterback, reportedly receives an annual salary of $33,500,000. I don’t hear complaints about the extravagant salaries celebrities receive. Instead, we admire their mansions and lavish lifestyles.
We all fall under the spell of our idols. At a pro baseball game, fans of all ages wear their favorite player’s number. Children made “Tickle Me Elmo” from their beloved Sesame Street a “must have” toy for Christmas. Teenage boys of my era adopted Elvis Presley’s pompadour and sideburns. Seeing a picture of the English actor, Helen Mirren, and noticing her haircut was similar to mine, made me hold my head a little higher.
When a cop stops a taxpayer for speeding, the officer is often reminded, “I pay your salary.” We, the people, also provide a celebrity’s exorbitant compensation. We dig deep in our pockets to buy tickets to attend sporting events, live performances and movies. We also lay out our hard-earned cash for the products providing the venue for television programs. Sponsors wouldn’t pay $5.6 million for a thirty-second commercial during Super Bowl LIV if they didn’t expect to recoup their investment from the purchases made by the audience estimated to be 100 million people.
We often give celebrities more credence than they deserve. Just because they’re adept at throwing a football, singing a song or acting like someone else, we accept as gospel their comments on any aspect of life.
During this political campaign season, the inequality of pay between a company’s executives and its workers is being questioned. How about the compensation of famous stars compared to the nameless crews making their performances possible?