This story is part of Re:’s Money Week, where we take a look at everything from asking your boss for a raise, to explaining what inflation actually is. Check out the rest of the stories here.

We crunched the numbers on the wage gap between the CEO and employees at some of New Zealand’s top-earning companies. 

New Zealand’s highest-earning CEO in a publicly traded company is Ross Taylor at Fletcher Building.

In the 2021 financial year he earned $5 million, plus $2 million in shares.

Fletcher Building doesn’t share employee wage data, but the median wage for New Zealand’s top 50 publicly traded companies is around $80,000.

So we can estimate the CEO of Fletcher Building earns 88 times more than his average employee.

The gap between CEO and worker pay has been widening in recent decades.

In 1997, average CEO pay was 11 times higher than the average worker salary.

In 2019, it had climbed to 18 times higher.

CEO wages are set by a company’s board of directors and are usually based on how much other CEOs make in similar industries and companies.

This means when one company increases the amount they pay a CEO, it increases how much other CEO positions are worth.

CEOs also make extra money based on how well their business performs. 

Here are the wage ratios in some of New Zealand’s highest earning companies.

Supermarkets:

Communications:

Energy:

Healthcare:

Transport: 

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