Angela Ahrendts, Burberry CEO, Is First Woman To Become The Highest-Paid Executive In Britain

An American female executive has finally risen to the top of one nation's pay ranks.

Burberry CEO and Indiana native, Angela Ahrendts, is now the highest-paid executive in Britain, according to a survey from Manifest, a British corporate governance group and pay consultancy firm MM&K, cited by the Guardian. At 16.9 million pounds, Ahrendts? pay package is almost 5 million pounds more than the next highest paid British executive, according to the Guardian.

While Ahrendts? achievement marks a significant step forward for high-powered women on either side of the pond, woman in both countries still face many obstacles to reaching Ahrendts? position. In Britain, Ahrendts is one of just three female CEOs running the country?s top companies. In the U.S., women make up just 4 percent of the CEOs at S&P 500 companies.

Despite Ahrendts? position as one of the few females at the top of the corporate ladder, she?s opposed potential policy changes that could help other British women get there. Ahrendts said last year that she isn?t in favor of quotas that would mandate a certain number of women be present on company boards, according to the Telegraph.

?Just put the best person into the job. It is not about gender, it is about experience, leadership and vision. A man could do this job,? she said.

That may be true, but often men are getting paid a lot more to do it. Ahrendts? pay -- which amounts to about $26.2 million -- pales in comparison to some of her American male counterparts. Oracle CEO Larry Ellison for example, earned $96 million last year, according CNNMoney.

Of course equality in the workplace isn?t an issue only faced by women at the top, the pay gap exists for ordinary women as well. In the U.S., female workers made about 80 percent of what their male counterparts earned last year, as the gender wage gap widened. And in Britain, the overall gender pay gap was about 19.7 percent last year, according to a separate Guardian report.

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/09/angela-ahrendts-highest-paid_n_3412361.html

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