CEO Pay Ratio Calculator
See how many years it would take your salary to match the CEO's annual compensation.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where does CEO pay data come from?▾
What is the CEO-to-worker pay ratio?▾
What is the Pay-for-Performance Score?▾
Has the CEO pay gap grown over time?▾
Updated April 2026 · SEC EDGAR proxy data
How to Read the Result
The calculator answers a single question: how many years would you need to work at your current salary to match what the chief executive earned last year? That number is mechanical division of two real figures — the CEO's reported total compensation from the most recent proxy statement, and your salary. The headline figure for each CEO is the “Total” column from the Summary Compensation Table in Form DEF 14A on SEC EDGAR, the federal database of corporate disclosures. That figure rolls up base salary, cash bonus, stock awards (typically RSUs and performance share units valued at grant date), option awards, non-equity incentive plan payouts, pension and deferred-comp changes, and a catch-all for perks.
What the calculator does not tell you: whether the pay was deserved. A high ratio at a fast-growing, high-margin company that vastly outperformed its peers can be defensible; a similar ratio at a company with declining revenue and a failed say-on-pay vote is a red flag. To form an opinion, look beyond the raw number — see our Pay-for-Performance methodology for the four-factor scoring model we use to grade alignment.
What Drives the Pay Gap
CEO pay at large U.S. public companies has grown roughly 1,000% since 1978 in inflation-adjusted terms, while typical worker pay has grown about 15% over the same period — figures published annually by the Economic Policy Institute. The single biggest driver is the shift from cash to equity. Stock awards now make up 50% to 70% of typical S&P 500 CEO compensation, so years when the broad market rises also produce surging headline pay numbers — even when company-specific performance is unremarkable.
Two proxy advisory firms, Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) and Glass Lewis, evaluate every public company's pay program against peer benchmarks and recommend how institutional investors should vote on say-on-pay. Their recommendations carry enormous weight: an “against” from ISS typically reduces shareholder support by 20-30 percentage points, which is why companies frequently restructure pay after a failed vote.
Industry Context
Across the 99 industries tracked here, the spread in median CEO compensation is wide. Tech, financial services, and pharmaceuticals tend to cluster at the top because equity grants are large and stock prices have appreciated. Utilities and consumer staples typically run lower because pay packages are more cash-weighted and stock-price upside is constrained by regulation. Comparing a CEO to peers in the same industry is more informative than comparing across sectors — a $25M package may be top-quartile in one industry and middle-of-the-pack in another. The site's industry pages show median compensation, median pay ratios, and grade distributions for each peer group.
For more on how the components of CEO pay fit together, read How CEO Pay Works, Stock Options vs RSUs, and How to Read a Proxy Statement.
Frequently Asked Questions
What does the CEO pay ratio actually measure?
The CEO pay ratio compares total CEO compensation (the figure reported in the Summary Compensation Table of the proxy statement) to the median employee's total compensation at the same company. A 400:1 ratio means the CEO earns in one year what a median employee earns in 400 years at the same wage. Companies have been required to disclose this number in their DEF 14A proxy statement every year since 2018, under Section 953(b) of the Dodd-Frank Act.
Why does the pay ratio vary so much between companies?
Three things drive most of the spread. First, workforce composition: a retail or hospitality chain with tens of thousands of part-time hourly workers will report a much lower median wage than a software company with all full-time engineers, which mechanically inflates the ratio at the retailer. Second, CEO pay mix: stock-heavy packages spike when share prices rise. Third, peer benchmarking: many compensation committees target the 50th-75th percentile of pay at peer companies, which produces ratchet effects over time. The median ratio across the 200 companies tracked here is roughly 157:1.
How accurate is the median worker number companies report?
SEC rules give companies discretion in how they identify the median employee — they can use any consistently applied compensation measure (wages, total cash, total compensation) and can choose any date within the last three months of the fiscal year. They can also exclude up to 5% of non-U.S. workers. As a result, two companies in the same industry can report meaningfully different ratios based on methodology choices. The numbers are still useful for tracking change over time at the same company, and for comparing companies with similar workforces.
How long would it take a median worker to earn what the CEO makes in one year?
That is exactly what the calculator computes. If you enter a salary of $55,000 and select a company where the CEO earned $20 million, the result is roughly 364 years — because $20,000,000 ÷ $55,000 = 363.6. This framing comes from the Economic Policy Institute and AFL-CIO Executive Paywatch, which publish the same comparison annually.
Where does the underlying compensation data come from?
Every CEO compensation figure in the calculator is pulled from SEC DEF 14A proxy statements filed on EDGAR. We extract the Summary Compensation Table "Total" column, which includes salary, bonus, stock awards (RSUs, PSUs valued at grant), option awards, non-equity incentive payouts, change in pension value, and other compensation. All filings are public domain and machine-readable in XBRL format for filings since 2018.
Source: CEO compensation figures come from SEC DEF 14A proxy statements filed via EDGAR (public domain). Data covers 200 top-paid public companies across 99 industries. Average CEO total compensation in the dataset: $12.2M. Cite as: “CEOPayWatch CEO Pay Ratio Calculator, accessed April 2026. Data: SEC DEF 14A proxy statements.”
Last refreshed 2026-04-06. This page presents publicly disclosed compensation data and is for informational purposes only — it is not investment advice.