CEOs at wealthy Ohio corporations make 396 times the typical worker
Posted December 20, 2022 in Press Releases
Fifty-four of Ohio’s largest employers paid their CEOs a median of 396 times what they paid the typical employee in 2021 – an increase over 2020’s ratio of 322, according to a new report by Policy Matters Ohio.
The federal Dodd-Frank Act requires publicly traded companies to provide the ratio of CEO pay to the median employee — the person whose pay falls in the middle of all employees. Policy Matters analyzed all 54 of Ohio’s top 100 employers that filed reports with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Average pay among this group of CEOs was nearly $21.7 million last year, up from $16 million in 2020. Meanwhile, these 54 corporations cut median pay for workers or added more low paying jobs, pushing the median pay down from $51,494 in 2020 to $48,283 last year. Fourteen corporations among the major employers reported median pay of less than $26,500, the federal poverty level for a family of four. Together, these 14 corporations — which include Wal-Mart, Victoria’s Secret, and Starbucks — employed nearly 146,000 Ohioans at the time of reporting.
“Last year corporate price gouging made it harder for many Ohioans to make ends meet, but many of the CEOs driving the problem did better than ever,” said lead report author Michael Shields. “Not only are CEOs getting richer by driving up prices, but they’re also doing it by holding down worker pay, simply because they have the power to do it.”
Policy Matters found that 17% of the corporations had a ratio greater than 1,000 — an all-time high since corporations began reporting the figures in 2017. This growth demonstrates both significant across-the-board CEO pay increases and how large outliers can distort averages. For example, Ohio’s fourth largest employer, Amazon, paid its new CEO Andrew Jassy $212 million last year compared to $32,855 for the typical employee – a ratio of 6,474-to-1. Some of the 41,000 Ohioans working at Amazon have been working to organize a union at the company, where workplace injuries trend at double the rate for the warehouse industry.
While Jassy’s pay is far and away the most lavish, Policy Matters found that many of the corporations with the highest ratios also paid typical workers the least, through a combination of low hourly wages and part-time hours.
- Starbucks, which employs 4,000 Ohioans, paid CEO Kevin Johnson $20.4 million last year, compared to $12,935 for the typical employee — a ratio of 1,579. Eight Ohio Starbucks stores have voted to unionize to secure better wages and fairer schedules. The National Labor Relations Board has cited the corporation for union busting.
- This is the first year that New Albany-based Abercrombie & Fitch hasn’t topped the list. After Amazon, A&F has the highest CEO-to-median employee ratio of 3,282 – paying CEO Fran Horowitz $12.8 million. In 2020, the typical A&F employee worked part-time for about $10 to $11 an hour. The corporation did not report hours for the median worker in the latest filing. This year, a documentary brought to light a legacy of racial discrimination in A&F’s hiring and staffing practices.
- With 42,000 Ohio employees, Cincinnati-based grocery chain Kroger is the state’s third-largest employer. CEO Rodney McMullen’s pay went down last year from $22.4 million to just under $18.2 million. He made 679 times as much as the typical employee, who was paid $26,763, just above the federal poverty line for a family of four. Unions help: In Central Ohio, 12,000 Kroger employees voted to strike, but were able to reach an agreement that protects their benefits and secures wage increases. Kroger is seeking federal approval for a. $24.6 billion merger with another supermarket chain, Albertsons.
“It’s no surprise that some of the corporations that pay their CEOs the most astronomical salaries are the same ones under fire for how they treat rank and file employees,” Shields said. “CEO pay helps concentrate wealth in the hands of the very few – most of whom are white men and are often removed from the day-to-day experience of the low-paid workers who are more likely to be women and people of color. Policymakers should make broadly shared prosperity for people of all races and genders their top priority. They can penalize corporations for outsized CEO pay, end stock buybacks, and rewrite the rules so working people are paid enough to provide for themselves and their families.”