A chief concern: how CEO pay has changed in the UK’s best known charities over the last five years

A chief concern: how CEO pay has changed in the UK’s best known charities over the last five years

 
Charity chief executives have recently found themselves under the spotlight in one area more than any other; their salaries. Plenty has been said about the public objecting to anyone at a charity earning over £100k a year, but we have been looking at how we got to this stage. Our data, drawn from the country’s top 50 most recognisable charities, looks back at CEO pay from 2007-2012 and what drives it.
 
We discovered that CEO salaries have broadly increased at the same rate as charitable income and that there has been something of a rebalancing in the sector, with higher salaries increasing far more slowly than the lower ones.
 
The main results:
  • Total income has increased by 17.7% (an average of 3.5% per year), with voluntary income up 11.6% (an average of 2.3% per year)
  • CEO salaries have risen 18% - almost exactly in line with charities' income
  • Staff costs have gone up 24.2% (an average of 4.85% a year)
  • There has been a re-balancing of salaries across the sector – those paying under £100k in 2007 have increased salaries by 38% on average, while those over £100k have increased pay by just 6%
  • Big charities do pay their CEOs more

 

The main report is available for download in the right hand corner of this page.

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