A DEA study of gender equity in executive compensation

Abstract

This study assesses whether annual and long-term compensation for senior executive women is equal to annual and long-term compensation for senior executive men. The group of executive women includes those women reported in the compensation tables of proxy statements for the companies in the Standard and Poors (S&P) 500 for 1997. Their compensation was compared to the compensation for two samples of executive men from S&P 500 firms using data envelopment analysis. The results indicate that the compensation paid to executive women is equitable to the compensation paid to executive men.

Keywords:

• executive compensation
• data envelopment analysis
• gender equity