Well… that's what the trivia section of the IMDB page for Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol says. Not banking solely on IMDB, I did some digging and found a few other sites saying the same thing, but most significantly was this quote from Ving Rhames while on the press tour for Death Race 2 in the fall of 2010:

"I live a very simple life. If I'm supposed to make 7.7 million US dollars and they're offering me three, I don't know if that's going to work. I did the last one for more than three million, there's no misunderstanding – it's 7.7 million or no!"

So did he get $7.7 million for what is effectively a cameo appearance in Ghost Protocol? Well, with a budget of about $150 million, I won't be surprised, combined with the fact that he and Tom Cruise are the only stars of the franchise who've appeared in all 4 Mission: Impossible movies. If he got about $3.5 million for the 3rd film, which is what my research says, then that means he likely got even less for the first 2, even though all 3 films averaged budgets of around $110 million, and his role in each was meatier than his role in the 4th.

So $7.7 milliion is fair; heck, maybe he should get even more.

Tom Cruise is probably getting 10 times that, when you factor in his back-end participation (percentage of box office); granted he's the franchie star.

So, while we're all wondering how Ving Rhames can afford to make all these shitty straight-to-DVD movies we've written about on S&A over the last 2 years, here's part of your answer: He's got $7.7 million to play with from a brief appearance in MI:4. He's comfy, I'm sure.