text: "Tonight Show" host Jay Leno is taking a significant reduction in pay and roughly two dozen staffers are being let go as part of a major budget restructuring at the late-night talk show. 
   
   Although "The Tonight Show" remains the top-rated late-night program, from a financial standpoint it is only break-even, according to a person familiar with the economics of the show. One reason for that is that the production budget of the show was not reduced when Leno moved back to late night after his ill-fated stint in prime time during the 2009-10 television season. 
   
   Leno's current salary is between $25 million and $30 million and he volunteered to take a cut if it would save some jobs. A person close to the network thought Leno's new salary is likely around $20 million. Bruce Bobbins, one of Leno's spokesmen, declined to comment. 
   
   [Updated at 10:49 a.m., Aug. 18: In a statement later Bobbins said, "Jay's foremost concern is for the wonderful people who work for 'The Tonight Show.' He did what was necessary to ensure their well-being."] 
   
   While an NBC spokeswoman declined to comment on the situation, the job losses are said to be between 20 and 25 people and many other senior staffers also agreed to pay cuts. 
   
   The weekly budget for Leno's prime time show was approximately $2.3 million and it stayed there when he returned to late night and Conan O'Brien was sent packing. The budget now will be closer to $1.7 million, which is in the range of what it was during Leno's previous late-night stint. 
   
   Leno is not the first late-night host to agree to a salary reduction. In 2009, CBS restructured David Letterman's deal and reduced his salary and the budget of the show. 
   
   Whether NBC will look to other areas to make additional cuts is yet to be determined. Earlier this year, the network trimmed its marketing and promotions staff. 
   
   News of the cuts were first reported by Deadline Hollywood. 
   
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   SATURDAY UPDATE: Jay Leno’s spokesman has now issued this statement: ”Jay’s foremost concern is for the wonderful people who work for The Tonight Show. He did what was necessary to ensure their well-being.” 
   
   BREAKING… EXCLUSIVE… FRIDAY 8:30 PM: NBC insiders tell me The Tonight Show went through ”downsizing” today and that 20 staffers lost their jobs. Others tell me the number is more like 25, and producers were forced to take pay cuts or lose their jobs. I’ve also learned that Jay Leno took what is being described as a “tremendous” pay cut to “save as many people’s jobs as he could”. Leno’s Tonight Show is consistently the #1 late night talk show in both households and demographics, except for some anomalies when Leno does get beaten. And that’s despite the fact that the network’s primetime ratings have been dismal for many years or that Leno himself was harshly criticized by the media for that January 2010 standoff with Conan O’Brien. Even so, The Tonight Show has been and still is a cash cow for NBC. So what happened to merit the downsizing? “I don’t think ad sales are off. I just think the people who bought this company, Comcast, wants to go through everything at NBC and get their money back,” an NBC insider tells me. ”It’s hard to go through those kinds of cuts. It’s more a network issue than a late-night issue. And I would say that Jay doesn’t get credit for digging out of a gigantic hole every single night. He’s a very valuable guy to NBC and someday everyone will understand that. He does a great job.” 
   
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   The downsizing also comes just 5 days after First Lady Michelle Obama appeared as a guest for the third time on The Tonight Show: high unemployment, job creation, and taxing the rich vs the poor all are issues in the 2012 president campaign. Leno has said publicly that he’s able to bank his entire Tonight Show salary and live on the hefty fees he makes from his hectic personal appearance schedule. Leno’s new salary is reportedly $27M-$30 million a year. He reportedly brings home another $15M-$20M a year from his other gigs. 
   
   Leno replaced Johnny Carson as host of The Tonight Show in 1992 after having been a regular substitute host since 1987. He “officially” ended hosting of The Tonight Show in 2009 when Conan O’Brien started on June 1st. Leno was going to be paid for all of 2009 by NBC even though he was only working six months of it. When his ratings dipped, O’Brien was asked to move The Tonight Show‘s time slot later to make room for Leno’s return at 11:30 PM. O’Brien refused. NBC gave Conan a $40M payoff (including salaries for his staff) to leave The Tonight Show hosting job which Leno resumed in 2010. 
   
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   Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
target: – Jay Leno has long said he lives off his standup money and takes the millions he gets paid for hosting the Tonight Show and sticks it right in the bank. So the news that Nikki Finke at Deadline Hollywood broke last night might not sting quite as much for him: One source tells her that Leno took a "tremendous" pay cut, and the LA Times confirms it was indeed "significant." The numbers require some guesswork, but the LAT thinks he went from somewhere between $25 million and $30 million down to about $20 million. Finke's numbers are higher. According to both accounts, Leno volunteered to take the cuts to save jobs, though at least 20 people got layoffs. Why the downsizing? Finke says it's not because of concerns about ratings or ad revenue, but because parent company Comcast is demanding cuts all around. She says the show is still a "cash cow." The LAT, meanwhile, says Leno's prime-time budget never got shaved when he moved back to later hours.