It's the $38 million that Tribune Co. CEO Dennis FitzSimmons is getting as he exits, stage right, as Chicago real estate developer Sam Zell takes control of the parent of the Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times and other media holdings.In an excellent post, blogger Alan Mutter recounts all the big numbers in the Tribune buyout. And he wonders how Zell is going to service the more than $10 billion in debt the newly leveraged company is taking on. "Given the uncertainty about the ability of any newspaper, including the Tribune properties, to quickly reverse years of steadily decaying sales," Mutter says, "it would seem that Sam has no choice but to reduce expenses as fast as he can."
Mutter continues: "And that means, among other things, reducing the work force in his newsrooms, where headcount is more elastic than, say, the number of people needed to run a printing press or pilot the delivery trucks."
That just goes to show: Rich businessmen looking for the newest trophy property can whack away just as well as a certain top newspaper publisher.
[Image: today's Times, Newseum]
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