Table 1

CEO compensation, CEO-to-worker compensation ratio, and stock prices, 1965–2014 (2014 dollars)

CEO annual compensation (thousands)* Worker annual compensation (thousands) Stock market (adjusted to 2014) CEO-to-worker compensation ratio***
Private-sector production/nonsupervisory workers Firms’ industry** S&P 500 Dow Jones
1965 $832 $40.2 n/a 579 5,986 20.0
1973 $1,087 $47.2 n/a 512 4,401 22.3
1978 $1,487 $48.0 n/a 320 2,735 29.9
1989 $2,769 $45.4 n/a 596 4,628 58.7
1995 $5,862 $46.0 $52.4 836 6,941 122.6
2000 $20,384 $48.7 $55.2 1,962 14,744 376.1
2007 $18,786 $51.1 $55.4 1,687 15,048 345.3
2009 $10,575 $53.2 $57.4 1,046 9,808 195.8
2010 $12,662 $53.7 $57.8 1,238 11,585 229.7
2011 $12,863 $53.0 $56.9 1,334 12,584 235.5
2012 $14,998 $52.6 $56.3 1,422 13,371 285.3
2013 $15,711 $52.8 $56.4 1,671 15,255 303.1
2014 $16,316 $53.2 $56.4 1,931 16,778 303.4
Percent change Change in ratio
1965–1978 78.7% 19.5% n/a -44.8% -54.3% 9.9
1978–2000 1,270.8% 1.4% n/a 513.0% 439.1% 346.2
2000–2014 -20.0% 9.4% 2.2% -1.6% 13.8% -72.7
2009–2014 54.3% 0.0% -1.7% 84.6% 71.1% 107.6
1978–2014 997.2% 10.9% n/a 503.4% 513.5% 244.7

* CEO annual compensation is computed using the "options realized" compensation series, which includes salary, bonus, restricted stock grants, options exercised, and long-term incentive payouts for CEOs at the top 350 U.S. firms ranked by sales.
** Annual compensation of the workers in the key industry of the firms in the sample
*** Based on averaging specific firm ratios and not the ratio of averages of CEO and worker compensation

Source: Authors' analysis of data from Compustat's ExecuComp database, Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED) from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, the Current Employment Statistics program, and the Bureau of Economic Analysis NIPA tables

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