It’s depressing how many employees of major corporations are living paycheck to paycheck, while the CEOs are deciding on the next foreign car they will purchase.
The ratio of worker to CEO pay does not agree with the fact that these companies will not be able to operate without the hard work and dedication their workers put into them.
Many Americans are not aware of the immense pay gap between CEOs and average employees. It was shown, in a study done by the Harvard Business School, Americans believe CEOs make 30 times the average worker’s pay when in fact it is 350 times.
According to Rant Finance, the most ridiculous CEO pay goes to Charif Souki of Cheniere Energy Inc. While the average worker makes $35,000, Souki makes $142 million — this is 4028 times the average worker’s pay.
The government should begin recommending companies create salary caps. If a company begins to fail, the government is, many times, going to be the ones to bail them out. The government depends on many of these companies to keep the American economy from going under — they work together.
The government shouldn’t strictly enforce salary caps because of the “free enterprise market system,” which limits government intervention. But, they should strongly advise these companies to set salary caps.
It’s hard to understand how it’s even possible for the employee that spends 40-plus hours working to get paid practically nothing compared to the “big dogs.”
According to Quartz, an economic news site, it will take the average worker at both McDonald’s and Starbucks more than six months to make what each company’s CEOs makes in one hour.
These companies would be nothing without their workers, and their CEOs do not give them the pay equity they deserve. This pay wage gap is a slap in the face to the average American citizen. It’s like the CEOs tell them, “You can come nearly everyday and slave for me while I roll in dough, and I’ll pay you just enough to get by.”
There is no reason why CEOs like the one of General Electric, Jeffrey Immelt, should be taking home $37 million in 2014 alone, especially after cutting down on retiree benefits. GE expanded retiree benefits cuts from salary positions to hourly production jobs, saving $3.3 billion.
According to The Washington Post, the average American CEO makes roughly $12 million, while CEOs in Switzerland, the country with the second highest CEO to worker pay wage gap, make roughly $7 million a year. Seven million dollars is already ridiculous, so the fact that CEOs in America are making nearly double that is absurd. Unfortunately, we can’t trust these large companies to have our best interests at heart. How they’ve gotten away with these salaries is the question of the century.
We can only hope that these CEOs see how wrong and outrageous this wage gap is, and that they come to their senses and begin working to minimize it. Worker unions and awareness for this inequality happening needs to continue to be created.
This is another inequality in America that, just like the rest, has to change.
Clarke Perkins is a 19-year-old political science sophomore from New Orleans, Louisiana. You can reach her on Twitter @ClarkePerkins.