Two reports on CEO pay have recently surfaced. One, from The Associated Press, claims compensation among 341 S&P 500 CEOs grew 4.5 percent last year. The other, from The New York Times, found compensation among 200 top CEOs decreased 15 percent between 2014 and 2016.
Why the disparity? According to The Washington Post, it's because AP and the Times looked at different CEOs.
The AP report examined "pay data for 341 executives, including some co-CEOs, at S&P 500 companies who have served two full consecutive fiscal years at their respective companies, who filed proxy statements between January 1 and April 30 [2015]." The Times report, which utilized data from the Equilar 200 Highest-Paid CEO Rankings, studied "the compensation of the chief executives of 200 public companies with annual revenue of at least $1 billion, that filed proxies by April 30[, 2016]."
By that interpretation, CEO compensation seems to be doing a bit of increasing and decreasing, depending on the executive and the company. On top of that, the CEOs on both lists likely won't take home the list amount in one year — oftentimes the compensation includes an amount that won't be available until after a certain period of time.