DETROIT — After a five-year wage freeze, Ford Motor Co. executive chairman Bill Ford Jr. is getting paid again.
It’s another sign that the automaker founded by his great-grandfather Henry Ford is healthy enough to award its top executives generous pay packages. The company recently said it earned $2.6 billion in the second quarter, its fifth-straight quarterly profit.
Bill Ford will be paid $4.2 million in salary and in stock options worth $11.6 million. The total represents pay he has earned over the past two years.
“The ongoing success of Ford Motor Co. is my life’s work and I am fully confident we are on track for sustained profitable growth through our commitment to building great products, a strong business and a better world,” Bill Ford said in an e-mail to employees obtained by The Associated Press.
In 2005, when Bill Ford was chairman and chief executive, he stopped taking a salary or bonus as the automaker floundered and racked up record losses. The following year, he stepped aside as chief executive and hired former Boeing Co. CEO Alan Mulally for the job. Mulally has been widely credited with streamlining the company and turning its operations around.
In 2008, Ford’s compensation committee ruled that Bill Ford could be paid from the beginning of 2008 on, once the company’s automotive operations returned to profitability. The committee recently decided those conditions have been met. Ford made $2.7 billion in 2009, its first annual profit in four years.
