Female chief executive officers are out-earning their male counterparts significantly — but it is a small sample size.
In 2015, the eight women who served in the top position at the 100 largest companies by revenue earned an average of US$22.7 million, compared to US$14.9 million for male chief executive officers on the Equilar 100 list.
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Chief executive officer pay appears to be rising overall, says Equilar, an executive compensation analysis firm. Median pay for all chief executive officers totaled $14.5 million. Median change in pay for all executives in the Equilar 100 was 3% in 2015.
Of the 101 chief executive officers in the study (Oracle has two chief executive officers), the eight women represent 7.9%. This is higher than the S&P 500, where 4.7% of leaders last year were women.
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Safra Catz and Mark Hurd, Oracle’s co-chief executive officers, are the highest-paid executives in the Equilar 100. Only two female chief executive officers fell outside the top 25: HP’s Meg Whitman, who resigned from her position in November 2015, earned US$17.1 million, and Duke Energy’s Lynn Good earned US$10.7 million on the strength of a 34% gain in pay year-over-year.
Among the eight women, median change in pay was 13% year over year. Whitman was the only female on the list whose pay package lost value last year. The full list of Equilar 100 female chief executive officers is below.
For the full 100 ranking, click here.
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