The DOI matches its Crossref record; 4 of the 4 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
How Much (More) Should CEOs Make? A Universal Desire for More Equal Pay
Open accessAbstract
Do people from different countries and different backgrounds have similar preferences for how much more the rich should earn than the poor? Using survey data from 40 countries ( N = 55,238), we compare respondents’ estimates of the wages of people in different occupations—chief executive officers, cabinet ministers, and unskilled workers—to their ideals for what those wages should be. We show that ideal pay gaps between skilled and unskilled workers are significantly smaller than estimated pay gaps and that there is consensus across countries, socioeconomic status, and political beliefs. Moreover, data from 16 countries reveals that people dramatically underestimate actual pay inequality. In the United States—where underestimation was particularly pronounced—the actual pay ratio of CEOs to unskilled workers (354:1) far exceeded the estimated ratio (30:1), which in turn far exceeded the ideal ratio (7:1). In sum, respondents underestimate actual pay gaps, and their ideal pay gaps are even further from reality than those underestimates.
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“American respondents underestimated the actual difference in income between CEOs and unskilled workers (354:1)”
From The psychology of social class: How socioeconomic status impacts thought, feelings, and behaviour (2018) · cites this paper as Kiatpongsan & Norton, 2014
In the citing paper
“their preferences regarding this difference (7:1) were more egalitarian than were their estimates (30:1).”
From The psychology of social class: How socioeconomic status impacts thought, feelings, and behaviour (2018) · cites this paper as Kiatpongsan & Norton, 2014
Citations
Cites
A Theory of Fairness, Competition, and Cooperation
Fehr, E., & Schmidt, K. M. (1999) · The Quarterly Journal of Economics · doi:10.1162/003355399556151 · Cited by 11,264
Building a Better America—One Wealth Quintile at a Time
Norton, M. I., & Ariely, D. (2011) · Perspectives on Psychological Science · doi:10.1177/1745691610393524 · Cited by 1,119
Self-citationAnalyses of Social Issues and Public PolicyPreprint
Aberson, C. L. (2018) · doi:10.31234/osf.io/j2zbe · Cited by 104
The social maximum: American attitudes toward extremely high incomes
Burak, E. (2012) · Research in Social Stratification and Mobility · doi:10.1016/j.rssm.2012.11.003 · Cited by 18
Research works printed but not linked: 2
- International Labour Organization, 2013, Global Wage Report 2012/13
- Mishel L., 2013, CEO pay in 2012 was extraordinarily high relative to typical workers and other high earners
Cited by
Sorted by citations
The psychology of social class: How socioeconomic status impacts thought, feelings, and behaviour
Manstead, A. S. R. (2018) · British Journal of Social Psychology · doi:10.1111/bjso.12251 · Cited by 831
“It is alsoworth noting that similar findings have been reported in a study of preferences for income inequality (Kiatpongsan & Norton, 2014), where it was found that American respondents underestimated the actual difference in income between CEOs and unskilled workers (354:1), and that their…”
ResultWhy people prefer unequal societies
Starmans, C., Sheskin, M., & Bloom, P. (2017) · Nature Human Behaviour · doi:10.1038/s41562-017-0082 · Cited by 556
(Mis)perceptions of inequality
Hauser, O., & Norton, M. I. (2017) · Current Opinion in Psychology · doi:10.1016/j.copsyc.2017.07.024 · Cited by 332
Self-citationSigns of Social Class: The Experience of Economic Inequality in Everyday Life
Kraus, M. W., Park, J. W., & Tan, J. J. X. (2017) · Perspectives on Psychological Science · doi:10.1177/1745691616673192 · Cited by 288
Americans misperceive racial economic equality
Kraus, M. W., Rucker, J. M., & Richeson, J. A. (2017) · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · doi:10.1073/pnas.1707719114 · Cited by 218
Metadata
- Authors
- Kiatpongsan, S., & Norton, M. I.
- Affiliations
- Chulalongkorn University (TH)
- Harvard University (US)
- ORCID
- Norton, Michael I.
- Venue
- Perspectives on Psychological Science
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2014-11
- Volume
- 9
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 587-593
- ISSN
- 1745-6916 (ISSN-L)
- 1745-6924
- OpenAlex
- W2039675961
- Cited by
- 337
- References
- 4
- Citations by year
- 2026: 21 · 2025: 26 · 2024: 40 · 2023: 46 · 2022: 39 · 2021: 26 · 2020: 24 · 2019: 42 · 2018: 26 · 2017: 18 · 2016: 15 · 2015: 12 · 2014: 2
- FWCI
- 51.03
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- nrs.harvard.edu
- Locations
- Perspectives on Psychological Science (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Digital Access to Scholarship at Harvard (DASH) (Harvard University) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Income, Poverty, and Inequality
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Labor market dynamics and wage inequality
- Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Social Policy and Reform Studies
- Keywords
- wage inequality, CEO compensation, wage gap, occupational pay, cabinet ministers, low-skilled workers, cross-national comparison, political beliefs, socioeconomic status
- MeSH terms
- Commerce, Cross-Cultural Comparison, Humans, Income, Political Systems, Politics, United States, Models, Economic, Internationality
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