The compensation of the managers have grown 56 times more than the average salary in the last 5 years

Global level, in the last 5 years the median remuneration of the business directors has grown by 50%, in real terms, going from 2.9 million dollars in 2019 to 4.3 million in 2024. An increase that exceeds 56 times the modest growth of the medium royal wages (+0.9%)recorded in the same period in the countries for which information on the compensation of CEOs is publicly available. This is what an Oxfam analysis reported on the occasion of May 1st reports.

The analysis of top managers salaries

In detail, among the countries where the sample of analyzed companies is sufficiently large, it emerges that Ireland and Germany boast some of the most paid CEOs with an average annual remuneration of 6.7 million and 4.7 million dollars respectively in 2024; In South Africa the annual compensation
Median of the top managers was 1.6 million dollars in 2024, while in India he reached $ 2 million. « Year after year we are witnessing the same show to say the least grotesque: the compensation of the ad grows dizzyingly, while the wages of the workers in many countries remain still or go up a few decimals », explains Mikhail Maslennikov, Policy Advisor on the economic justice of Oxfam Italia.

Gender gaps

Oxfam’s analysis also focused on gender wage gaps at business level. By examining 11,366 companies of 82 countries, which publish information on the corporate gender pay gap, it is clear that the gender salary gap at the corporate level is, on average, reduced between 2022 and 2023, going from 27% to 22%. But between the 45,501 companies of 168 countries with an annual turnover of more than $ 10 million and which report the genre of their CEO, less than 7% had a woman in the apical position of the corporate organigram.

The variation of the shopping cart

For the dynamics of real wages in Italy, according to Oxfam if, instead of resorting to the general inflation indices, reference was made to the variation of the prices of the shopping cart (as approximation of the goods most consumed by workers with low wages), the national gross wage would recordon average, a cumulative loss of about 15% in the four-year period 2019-2023 and the positive dynamics of 2024
It would only represent a placebo for workers with the lower wages.

The minimum salary is missing

«Until now, in the action of the government there is a clear industrial policy, aimed at creating quality jobs, which bets on innovation, green transition and training, without leaving anyone behind. – concludes Maslennikov – The government is difficult to intervene on the strengthening of the bargaining collective and on the revision of the setting system of wages and has related to the minimum legal salary that represents an essential protection for the most fragile workers ».