The Highest-Paid In-House Counsel

Cash pay for in-house counsel was down overall last year, but you wouldn’t know it from the amounts the highest-paid company lawyers pulled in. The highest-paid in-house counsel last year was Walt Disney’s Alan Braverman, who received $7.03 million in cash compensation. A close second was Thomas Mason, general counsel for Energy Transfer Equity, who received $6.8 million. Then: 21^st Century Fox’s Gerson A. Zweifach, who received $6.325 million; CBS’ Lawrence Tu who received $3.9 million; and Viacom’s Michael Fricklas, who received $3.287 million. Despite the sky-high paychecks for the elite, cash compensation slid by two percent overall in 2015 compared with the previous year. The average general counsel at a big company makes around $700,000, but the compensation figures include salary, bonuses, and nonequity compensation.