Millions of Americans are cutting back on their expenses as their incomes fall short of rising costs. At the same time, the country’s top executives are receiving staggering compensation packages—with some earning more than the typical U.S. employee in under 24 hours. The head of America’s biggest private employer can even accumulate enough for a house in less than a standard workweek.
McMillon, who has been at the helm of the $905 billion retail behemoth since 2011, receives approximately $27.5 million in total pay. He is stepping down at the month’s end, concluding his tenure on a financial peak; in his last year as CEO, McMillon earned a base salary of $1.5 million, along with $20.4 million in stock awards and $4.4 million from a non-equity incentive plan.
This contrasts sharply with his early earnings. The departing CEO began his career in the company’s warehouses during the summer of 1984, unloading trucks for a mere $6.50 per hour. That amount is 481 times less than the $3,127 he now makes each hour as chief executive. He surpasses that old hourly wage in just one minute, earning about $52 every 60 seconds.
Currently, the CEO needs fewer than 20 hours to surpass the annual income of the average U.S. worker, which is around $62,088, based on 2025 data from the BLS. While many Americans spend years saving for a home, McMillon can accumulate the median U.S. home price of $439,000 in just 5.85 days, according to a report. During the average 30-minute commute that workers face, McMillon’s wealth increases by $1,563. His bank balance grows by nearly one dollar every second.
contacted Walmart for a statement.
While CEOs are reaping record-breaking salaries, Americans are bunkering down
McMillon is just one example among many CEOs garnering attention for their substantial pay.
Last year, the head of an electric vehicle company and the world’s wealthiest individual, secured a significant compensation package, highlighting the expanding gap between the planet’s richest and poorest employees.
Furthermore, the CEO of the $3.8 trillion technology powerhouse received $74.6 million in 2024, an 18% rise from the $63.2 million he earned the previous year. In roughly seven hours, he out-earns the typical American worker, and in 2.15 days, he can afford an average-priced U.S. home. However, he isn’t the highest-paid CEO of a major U.S. public corporation. The chief of the $45.5 billion defense-technology firm Axon received $164.5 million, as per data from Equilar.
In contrast, America’s lowest-income workers are not benefiting from their companies’ prosperity. The after-tax income for workers in the bottom tier grew only 1.3% year-over-year this July, a decrease from 1.6% the prior month, according to an Institute. During that same timeframe, wages for higher-income individuals increased by 3.2%—marking the third straight month of growth. This represented the largest disparity in wealth between low and high-income families in four years.
“In some sense, we had an improvement in lower-income wage growth since the pandemic, and now that’s gone into reverse,” David Tinsley, senior economist for the Bank of America Institute, stated this August. “There was a narrowing of wealth inequality, and now it’s widening.”
Nevertheless, some corporations are taking action to make sure their employees receive a equitable portion of the profits. One company introduced a new three-year initiative last year that will provide bonuses to its staff tied to the firm’s stock performance from October 2025 to October 2028, as reported by Bloomberg. The program also allows employees to choose to take up to half of that bonus in company shares rather than cash. Before this financial initiative, the only other time workers received stock was when Samsung gave 30 shares to employees as part of a union agreement.
Even billionaires are addressing the increasing economic division. Reacting to a finding that billionaire wealth grew by $33 trillion between 2015 and 2025, entrepreneur Mark Cuban remarked that wealth has climbed because “the stock market has gone straight up.” He argued that employees deserve a share of the success.
“You know who is funding the increase, particularly lately? Retail investors. 401ks,” Cuban said last year. “The better question is, why are we not giving incentives to companies to require them to give shares in their companies to all employees, at the same percentage of cash earnings as the CEO?”