“In a hard-driving city like Dallas, where success is measured at the bottom line, salaries and macho are inextricably intertwined,” John Merwin wrote in the intro to D Magazine’s January 1975 story “Paycheck Peeking,” in which he scoured SEC reports and public records, and made cold calls to pry into the numbers people were pulling in. The piece revealed the salaries of 273 people, everyone from Carl the Dog ($25 per hour; $150 in today’s dollars) to UTD’s Nobel prize–winning physics prof, Polykarp Kusch ($37,440 annually; $225,321 today).
“We were kind of filching there,” says Jim Atkinson, this magazine’s first editor, admitting that the concept was borrowed from New York Magazine. No matter, the piece only sharpened D Magazine’s edgy reputation as a publication willing to dig into juicy subjects that newspapers would not dare. “That kind of thing helped build a bond between us and our readers because they couldn’t get that kind of story, that kind of information, anywhere else.”
While New York’s salary exposé caused an uproar in the Big Apple, D got little flak for printing pay stubs. “As I recall, people were mostly mum, wisely deciding that bitching would only draw more attention,” Atkinson says. “I think back on that, and, let’s face it, it was an unbelievably rude thing to do. Just generally, though, there was pretty good buzz in watering holes where I hung out, my preferred focus group format.”
Rude as it may be, we couldn’t help ourselves from taking a quick glance at some of the salaries and correcting for inflation to compare numbers then and now.
The highest-paid individual on the 1975 list, at $374,054 ($2.25 million today), was Paul Thayer, the motorcycle-riding, airplane-flying—not to mention marriage-cheating—chairman of aerospace-and-steel company LTV, who was busted 10 years later for insider trading. (LTV dissolved in 2001.) Second-highest: Mark Shephard Jr., president of Texas Instruments, who earned $358,000 in base pay and bonuses, about $2.15 million today. In 2023, TI’s top dog, Haviv Ilan, took in close to $16.2 million between salary, bonus, and equity awards.
First-year public school teachers are also faring better. In 1974, rookie Terri Cully collected $7,700, which comes to $46,340 today. Last year, DISD raised its minimum annual wage to $61,000 and added a $3,000 hiring incentive in an effort to fill post-pandemic vacancies.
In May, city officials made a deal to keep Eddie García by supplementing the police chief’s $306,440 salary with a biannual $10,000 retention bonus. His 1970s counterpart, Don Byrd, made $30,843 ($185,619 today). Otherwise, many civil service jobs—county clerk, library director, municipal court judges—earn salaries that have kept pace with the rate of inflation. One wage lagging behind is that of U.S. congressmen. James Collins, the 3rd District representative, made $42,500 in 1974, which would be $255,773 now. Compare that to current U.S. Rep. Keith Self of McKinney, who takes home only $174,000.
DFW Airport, which went wheels up in January of 1974, paid $45,000 ($270,818 today) to Ernest Dean, its first executive director, that year. Nowadays, DFW is the third-busiest airport in the world, and its CEO, Sean Donohue, got a raise and bonus approved for 2023 that brought his take-home to $823,942.
Leading a newspaper is more lucrative now than it was when paperboys hit almost every driveway on city streets. Dallas Morning News CEO Grant Moise pulled in nearly $1.5 million last year, while his closest 1975 counterpart (the publisher of the Dallas Times Herald; D didn’t nab numbers for the DMN back then) made $164,117, which comes to about $987,688 today. (Also interesting: the for-profit DMN sent out a plea this January, asking the public to help fund 10 journalism jobs to the tune of $2 million.)
When it comes to pay increases, professional athletes are the clear champions.
But when it comes to pay increases, professional athletes are the clear champions. In 1975, we noted that Jeff Burroughs, a Texas Rangers outfielder and the American League’s MVP, was “very definitely underpaid” at only $40,000 ($240,728 today). Compare that to Rangers rookie Wyatt Langford, who is making $740,000 as a left fielder this season—on top of his record-breaking $8 million signing bonus as the team’s first-round pick in July 2023.
That past-to-present wage gap widens dramatically looking at America’s Team. Roger Staubach, the quarterback who led the Dallas Cowboys to their first Super Bowl victory in 1972, renegotiated to make $75,000 in 1974 ($451,365 in today’s bucks). In 2021, Dak Prescott signed a four-year, $160 million contract extension. (As of press time, Prescott has no new deal after this coming season.) The Dallas Cowboys franchise, of course, has become a business bonanza decade over decade. Acquired by Jerry Jones in 1989 for $150 million, the Cowboys are the most valuable sports franchise in the world, with an estimated worth of $9.2 billion.
This story originally appeared in the July issue of D Magazine with the headline “Paycheck Peeking Redux.” Write to holland@dmagazine.com.
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