News presenters in the US are often paid incredible amounts of money – but still, some are worth more than others.
The highest paid news anchor in the US today is Matt Lauer, who is paid $25m (€19.5m) for his role on NBC’s morning news programme Today. The other two anchors of the show, Al Roker and Savannah Guthrie, make $7m (€5.46m) and $2m (€1.56m) respectively.
Lauer may be the highest paid in total, but when looking at his 4.2m audience share, he is only paid $5.89 (€4.59) per viewer.
This is far below Anderson Cooper of CNN, who has a pay packet of $11m (€8.59m) and is paid $18.09 (€14.08) per viewer for his show Anderson Cooper 360°.
Indeed, CNN pays its news anchors the highest amount per viewer, with Piers Morgan making $10.71 (€8.34) per viewer and Wolf Blitzer making $7.30 (€5.68) per viewer, for a total of $6m (€4.68m) and $3m (€2.34m) respectively.
On the other end of the scale, CBS and ABC pay the lowest per viewer for their news presenters.
Gayle King, host of CBS This Morning, is paid only $0.85 (€0.66) per viewer for a total of $2m (€1.56m). Scott Pelley who presents the CBS Evening News, makes $0.87 (€0.68) per viewer for a yearly salary of $5m (€3.9m).
One of the highest paid news presenters in the US is Diane Sawyer, host of ABC’s weeknightly World News, who makes $12m (€9.37m) per year. However, with a viewership of 7.3m, ABC only pays her $1.63 (€1.27) per viewer.
Another highly paid news anchor is Bill O’Reilly, host of The O’Reilly Factor on the controversial Fox News Channel. O’Reilly is paid $20m (€15.6m). Fox News pays its other presenters well, too, including $15m (€11.7m) for Sean Hannity and $10m (€7.8m) for Shepard Smith, who presents Fox Report and Studio B.
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) does not make available their news presenters’ salaries – though it’s expected they are dwarfed by those offered by the commercial network. But the salaries of its executives are another matter,
Paula Kerger, the CEO of PBS, is known to make over $632,000 (€493,000), which is more than the US President makes every year.
Even more surprising to many is the salary of Gary Knell – president and CEO of Sesame Workshop, the non-profit body behind Sesame Street – who is paid $956,000 (€746,350) a year.
Directors for PBS segments can make anywhere between $77,000 (€60,113) and $83,000 (€64,798), while executive directors make up to $200,000 (€156,140).
