Almost 20 million euros: That’s how much Linde boss Steve Angel earned last year. It is a number that should make people pause, a number that sends the wrong signal to the economy and above all to society. Angel received a good 40 percent more compensation in 2021 than in the previous year. He is the top earner among the CEOs of the Dax companies. On average, the top managers received 24 percent more remuneration than in the previous year and came to a salary of around six million euros, as determined by a study presented on Wednesday.
However, group profits rose much more sharply in the past year – by an average of 122 percent in the Dax and by 52 percent in the case of Linde. And the valuations on the stock market also increased. The industrial gas giant Linde even managed to replace the software manufacturer SAP as the most valuable Dax group.
Measured by the profit development and the increased stock market values, the increased boss salaries could therefore appear justified. Especially since the remuneration systems have been changed in recent years as a result of political and social pressure so that financial targets have been more firmly anchored in the variable remuneration.
In other words, board members are increasingly being paid according to performance, and this is measured by indicators such as share prices and return on capital employed.
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The salary of the American Angel can also be put into perspective: Compared to his compatriot Pat Gelsinger, CEO of the chip company Intel, he is almost on the low side. According to the calculations of the study, Gelsinger received around 92 million euros in 2021, almost five times as much as Angel.
Dax bosses earn a multiple of their employees
But apparently only the Dax bosses benefited from the strong numbers in the balance sheets and on the stock exchanges in 2021. Gross salaries in Germany as a whole only increased by 3.7 percent. Double-digit pay rises within a year didn’t push through even the most self-assured union bosses.
In addition, the board members of the large listed corporations earn many times the salary of their employees. Her executive salary was 53 times higher than that of your average employee. In 2020 it was “only” 47 times that.
In a country, or rather a western economic world, that is suffering from record energy prices, a corona pandemic and high inflation, such salary increases do not seem acceptable. In 2020, some board members had waived their bonuses in view of the corona pandemic.
It would have been good, and it would have been even better received – keyword: envy debate – if they had also practiced a little more modesty in 2021. Less is sometimes more.
More: These are the top earners among the Dax bosses.