A new critique from the Montreal Economic Institute argues that the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives is distorting the national conversation on executive compensation by relying on what it calls a tiny, unrepresentative slice of corporate Canada.Renaud Brossard, the MEI’s vice president of communications, says the CCPA’s annual CEO‑pay report leans on “big splashy numbers” rather than meaningful analysis. He argues the study’s focus on the top 100 firms in the country — just 0.009% of all Canadian companies — creates a misleading picture of how executives are paid.According to Brossard, those firms are among the most productive in the country and tend to pay all employees well, not just their CEOs. Sectors like tech, banking and resource extraction routinely offer higher‑than‑average compensation, he notes.Statistics Canada data supports the idea that large employers pay more broadly. Workers at companies with more than 500 employees earn, on average, 16.5% more than those at firms with fewer than five employees..The MEI argues that a more realistic comparison would look at average full‑time workers versus full‑time senior managers across the economy. StatsCan data from 2024 shows senior managers earned an average of $191,424, while full‑time workers earned $76,244 — a ratio of 2.5 to one. That stands in stark contrast to the CCPA’s claim of a 248‑to‑one CEO‑to‑worker pay gap.Brossard also pushes back on the idea that CEO compensation is arbitrary or disconnected from results. He points to research showing that executive pay — especially stock‑based compensation — tends to rise and fall with company performance and future outlook.Academic work published after the financial crisis reinforces that view. Studies found CEO compensation varies significantly with firm size and market performance, with stock options and other performance‑linked components playing a major role.
