WRESTLING NEWS
Aew Owner Shahid Khan Only Earned $1.20 An Hour For His First American Job
By ROBERT GUNIER
Shahid Khan, co-owner of All Elite Wrestling alongside his son Tony, is the epitome of "The American Dream." In 1967, Shahid left his middle-class life in Lahore, Pakistan, to begin school at America's University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign — where he got his first job as a dishwasher making $1.20, which is equal to $10.17 in 2022.
While still in school, Shahid became an engineer at automotive parts supplier Flex-N-Gate, and would later start his own company Bumper Works. Shahid made his fortune when he bought out Flex-N-Gate and turned it into a company worth billions, and with that money, he went on to start All Elite Wrestling with his son, Tony, who acts as CEO and president.
Tony, a big wrestling fan, brought the idea of AEW to Shahid, but he was not convinced it would succeed. "I put the business plan together, and I was pretty much ready to commit to it. But again, he had cold feet. We had some very uncomfortable conversations where I told him that this was going to be great,” Tony said in a 2021 interview.