Overview
- Oxfam released a study in early June that analyzed 2022–2024 data for the 100 largest European firms and concluded their pay and payout choices increase inequality and undercut climate investment.
- The report found average CEO pay near €6 million in 2024 and an average CEO-to-employee ratio of about 78:1, while a subset of firms that disclosed full pay distributions showed chiefs earn the equivalent of a median worker’s annual pay in just 2.5 days.
- Disclosure gaps are significant: 89 of the 100 companies published CEO pay but only about half reported gender-pay data and only roughly half provided the full salary distributions needed for median-based comparisons.
- Oxfam documented that companies prioritized shareholders over climate, with half of firms giving 32 times more to shareholders than to green investment and an average payout of over two-thirds of profits; several firms paid dividends despite recording losses in 2024.
- Oxfam urged policy measures including a permanent windfall tax, a 20:1 executive-to-median pay cap, and full implementation of the EU pay-transparency directive, a set of steps that could shift corporate returns toward workers and climate spending and that regulators and governments will now be pressured to consider.