Bloomberg- Top private-equity and hedge fund managers made more in 10 minutes than average-paid U.S. workers earned all of last year, according to a new study from two research groups.<\/p>\n
The 20 highest-paid fund managers made an average of $657.5 million, or 22,255 times the U.S. average annual salary of $29,500, said the study, released today by Institute for Policy Studies and United for a Fair Economy. The study cited data from the U.S. Labor Department and Forbes magazine.<\/p>\n
“The fact that these pay levels for fund managers are so out-of-sight is going to drive up pay at publicly traded companies,” said Sarah Anderson, director of the global economy program at the Washington-based Institute for Policy Studies and a co-author of the study. “There are people out there with a straight face claiming that public company executives are underpaid.”<\/p>\n
The private equity boom in the past year has pushed the pay ceiling for fund managers “further into the economic stratosphere,” the study said.<\/p>\n
Chief executive officers at large U.S. corporations averaged $10.8 million in pay last year, the study said, citing an Associated Press survey. Their weekly pay of $207,700 was about seven times the average worker’s annual salary.<\/p>\n
The study’s authors said top hedge-fund managers are making more in a fraction of an hour than a typical worker makes in a year. The hedge-fund chiefs average $12.6 million a week, or $210,700 an hour based on a 60-hour week. That’s $35,100 every 10 minutes, compared with $29,500 a year for the average worker.<\/p>\n