Shareholder support strengthens even as median pay rises 6% – but outlier awards draw intensifying scrutiny.
Median CEO pay at S&P 500 companies reached $17.5 million in 2026, up 6% from the prior year and 63% higher than the $10.7 million recorded in 2017, according to a new report by The Conference Board.
The report, created with compensation consulting firm FW Cook and ESG data analytics firm ESGAUGE, found that across the broader Russell 3000, the median CEO pay rose 7% to $7.1 million.
The figures arrive at a moment when compensation committees face growing pressure to justify pay decisions, not just in dollar terms, but in design, rationale, and alignment with long-run performance, and is indicative of a market where equity is increasingly doing the heavy lifting, and where exceptional awards are drawing disproportionate fire.
Equity, not salary, is driving the increase
The growth in CEO pay since 2021 has not come primarily through base salary. According to the Conference Board/ESGAUGE data, median base salary increased approximately 16% in both indexes over that period. By contrast, median performance-award values rose 51% in the Russell 3000 and 46% in the S&P 500. Time-based restricted stock award and restricted stock unit values climbed 57% and 38%, respectively, in the Russell 3000.
The strategic logic is straightforward: salary increases raise fixed compensation indefinitely, while equity gives compensation committees room to increase potential value while retaining vesting schedules and performance conditions.
As equity makes up a larger share of the total package, headline compensation figures increasingly reflect grant-date accounting estimates rather than cash in hand; a distinction that matters for clients evaluating proxy disclosures and say-on-pay votes.
Incentive plan design is shifting in parallel. Performance shares and performance stock units were used by 71% of Russell 3000 companies in 2026, up from 60% in 2019. Time-based RSAs and RSUs increased from 71% to 84% over the same period, while stock options fell from 40% to 25%. In the S&P 500, PSU prevalence held at 91%, while options dropped from 47% to 33%.
The data suggest that boards are consolidating around a model that blends performance and retention components rather than adopting any single approach.
Company size remains the clearest dividing line
Scale, not sector, is the strongest predictor of CEO pay. Among Russell 3000 companies with less than $100 million in annual revenue, median reported CEO compensation was $3.4 million. At companies with at least $50 billion in revenue, the median reached $23.6 million – a difference of nearly sevenfold.
The composition of pay shifts with size too. Salary accounted for 24% of the total package at the smallest revenue cohort and just 8% at the largest, according to the Conference Board/ESGAUGE analysis.
That gap matters for how advisors and analysts interpret index-wide medians: a broad benchmark is a poor proxy for any specific company’s peer group, and proxy advisory firms including Vanguard’s internal stewardship function have increasingly emphasized peer-group appropriateness as a distinct governance question separate from pay level alone.
Consumer staples, financials, and utilities recorded the largest year-over-year increases in the Russell 3000 in 2026, rising 25%, 22%, and 16%, respectively. Information technology and health care were essentially unchanged. The sector-level figures carry a caution: cohort composition shifts year to year, and grant timing can move a sector median without reflecting across-the-board pay changes within that sector.
Shareholders support pay – but not outliers
Despite rising overall pay, shareholder backing for executive compensation proposals strengthened in 2026. According to the Conference Board/ESGAUGE data, 76% of Russell 3000 say-on-pay proposals received at least 90% support, up from 72% the prior year. Only 0.9% failed outright. In the S&P 500, 73% of proposals cleared the 90% threshold and just 1.1% failed.
The dissent that did surface was concentrated. Warner Bros. Discovery received just 15.6% support after disclosing $165 million in CEO compensation, a package that included a special option award. Aon received 38.4% support following a $50 million target-value performance stock unit grant tied to an employment extension through 2030.
The pattern, consistent with findings from proxy advisory firms ISS and Glass Lewis — both of which extended their pay-for-performance assessment periods to five years for the 2026 season — suggests investors are not broadly opposed to higher pay but are scrutinizing awards that depart from standard annual programs without clear justification.
CEO security becomes a governance issue at large companies
One of the more pointed findings in the 2026 data is the rapid spread of personal and home security benefits, which the report attributes in part to the December 2024 killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in New York.
Among S&P 500 CEOs, 34% received personal and home security benefits in 2026, up from 18% in 2024. In the Russell 3000, 11% of CEOs received such benefits, more than double the figure from two years prior. At the largest companies – those with at least $50 billion in annual revenue – 60% of Russell 3000 CEOs now receive personal and home security.
The Conference Board report notes that median disclosed costs were approximately $68,600 in the Russell 3000 and $101,900 in the S&P 500 among recipients, though the 20 largest security expenditures in the Russell 3000 averaged approximately $4.3 million, with security spending of $12.6 million reported for Stephen A. Schwarzman at Blackstone and $8.8 million for Sundar Pichai at Alphabet.
The report frames security increasingly as a duty-of-care question for boards rather than a conventional executive perk. Personal use of corporate aircraft was reported for 48% of S&P 500 CEOs, up from 43% in 2025, with some boards now requiring or encouraging aircraft use for security purposes.
Women near 10% of S&P 500 CEO roles
Women accounted for 9.3% of S&P 500 CEOs and 7.7% of Russell 3000 CEOs in 2026, up from approximately 6% in both indexes in 2021. Progress in the broader named executive officer population has been steadier: women made up 20.3% of non-CEO senior executives in the S&P 500, up from 16.1% in 2021.
The succession pipeline, however, remains uneven. Women held 37.2% of chief legal officer positions in the S&P 500 and 63.8% of chief human resources officer roles, but only 17% of CFO positions and 14.4% of COO positions. Since financial and operating roles are common pathways to the CEO seat, the composition of those pipelines will shape representation at the top for years to come.
In unadjusted terms, median reported CEO compensation in 2026 was $17.8 million for women and $17.5 million for men in the S&P 500, and $7.7 million versus $7.0 million in the Russell 3000. The Conference Board notes these figures do not control for company size, sector, tenure, or grant timing, and should not be read as definitive pay-gap measures.
Leave a comment