21st Century CEOs Make More

The 21st century has worked wonders on the wallets of Chief Executive Officers. For the top 350 largest firms in the United States, CEOs have received a hefty payday compared to both their employees and to CEOs of the past.

The metric the Economic Policy Institute used to analyze this pay ratio included realized stock options along with salaries, bonuses, restricted stock grants, and long-term incentive payouts to calculate the total take-home pay for CEOs. Even top earning employees at these companies still, on average, make 5 times less than their executives, while wage growth has remained flat for the average worker.

The significant pay raise for the heads of these major companies came at the end of the 20th century when, between 1978 and 2000, the compensation for CEOs widened by over 1,200 percent.