'New York' Salary Issue, Courtesy of Google?
This week's New York mag cover story is a brilliant study in class envy: It's the salary issue, in which the projected payoffs of various Manhattanites are presented in a handy listicle, ready for your shock and ire.
We have to question, however, accuracy of the piece — after all, Gawker is featured with a number so ridiculously incorrect that, upon seeing it, we spit $100 bills from our mouths. And if our salary can be so egregiously misquoted, who else's number is way off? Surely the $1.5 million attributed to Blinky Malcolm Gladwell doesn't take into account those pesky agent fees, and we highly doubt Times crossword hottie Will Shortz is worth only $90,000. Dave Chappelle made $0 this year? Bullshit. Media blogfather Jim Romenesko's salary, quoted at $169,187, was accurate a few years ago. We're not sure that's much better than never being accurate at all.
Also: Why can't we get some salaried insight into the pockets of New York's finest, like Kurt Andersen or Adam Moss? Perhaps including them would have forced the publication to get something right — but we certainly wouldn't want to ruin the vibe with boring old veracity.
