In 2018, the board chairmen earned an average of 7.2 percent more than in the year before. This is a total amount of EUR 1.83 million. This is evident from an investigation by de Volkskrant to 117 leading Dutch companies and institutions. The Cao wages grew by only 2.1% in the same period.
The absolute big-earner is Shell-Topman Ben van Beurden, who earned 20.1 million euro in 2018. Also Nancy McKinstry of Wolters Kluwer (13.7 million euro), Gillian Tans of Booking.com (12.7 million) and Jean-François van Boxmeer of Heineken (9 million) are among the top five in terms of salary.
The largest wage gap was found at Unilever, where Topman Paul Polman earned 283 times as much as the average employee at the company. The biggest riser was Stephan Borchert of Grandvision, who advanced in 2018 more than 60 percent compared to the year before.
The increase in the rewards for directors is mainly due to the good stock market prices, increased profits and higher values of shares. It is mainly the top salaries of the largest Dutch companies and multinationals that are jumping out. For ‘ ordinary ‘ large companies, the reward increase was less spectacular and in (semi) State institutions the rewards declined.
“The top benefits the most, while the employees who make the profits possible are too often seen as a cost item,” says coordinator employment policy Zakaria Boufangacha of trade union FNV to the Volkskrant. The Union denounces the growing gap between large-service workers and employees.
By: NU.nl
