Make Me Smart

Why do CEOs get paid so much?

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In 1965, the ratio of CEO-to-average-worker compensation was 21:1. In 2020, that number had skyrocketed to 351:1. One listener wondered: “How has that gap grown so wide?” We answer that, plus why gas prices list the tenth of a cent and if unlimited vacation is all it’s cracked up to be on this Whaddya Wanna Know Wednesday.

Here’s everything we talked about on the show today:

  • CEO pay has skyrocketed 1,322% since 1978: CEOs were paid 351 times as much as a typical worker in 2020 from the Economic Policy Institute
  • In 2020, top CEOs earned 351 times more than the typical worker from CNBC
  • CEO pay jumped 16% last year, while workers saw just a 1.8% gain from Fortune
  • Alphabet grants tens of millions of dollars in stock awards to top execs from MSN
  • Why do gas prices end in 9/10 of a cent? from Marketplace
  • Why unlimited vacation isn’t all it seems from Marketplace
  • Companies with unlimited PTO are forcing their employees to take it from Protocol
  • Will the pandemic make the U.S. more of a vacation nation? from Marketplace

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