FTSE 350 companies are expected to pay chief executives 63 times the wage of an average employee this year, according to new research from the High Pay Centre, which analysed 69 companies.
The pay inequality gap between company executives and other workers shrunk during Covid-19 but the gap has grown again since the pandemic.
In 2021, the pay ratio between CEOs and average workers was 34:1, with the retail sector the largest culprit in reversing the slimming pay inequality in recent months. Pay differentials were lowest in the media and financial sectors.
"For many households the cost of living's rising, their economic situation is getting a lot worse not better, but that doesn't seem to be stopping the big companies that are making big profits from paying vast amounts to their chief executives and people at the top while not necessarily awarding pay rises to lower-earning workers who are struggling with that cost of living," Luke Hilyard, director of the High Pay Centre, told the BBC.
Ken Murphy, the boss of Tesco, pocketed £4.74mln including a £3.2mln bonus in the financial year to February. or 224 times the total pay and benefits of the median member of staff at Tesco, which was £21,117.
The grocer recently agreed to increase the pay of its hourly-paid store and customer fulfilment centre workers by 5.8% but that still pales in comparison with its CEO.
Major employers have "a key role to play balancing their pay awards so that high, middle and low earners are all paid fairly and proportionately,” Hildyard added.
As well as falling real wages with inflation at 9% and fed by rising fuel, food and energy prices, higher national insurance is beginning to take its toll.
The double whammy of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s most recent lockdown has further piled pressure on people’s pockets.
Meanwhile, trade unions have called for maximum pay ratios to “bring some fairness back” to the system, while six in 10 people think company bosses should be prevented from earning over 10 times the average paid employee, according to Guardian polls.
Mubin Haq, chief executive of the abrdn Financial Fairness Trust, which contributed to the think tank research said the narrowing pay gap during the pandemic showed “change is possible.”