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October 01, 2014 at 10:55 AM
The nonprofit sector’s glass ceiling is intact.
A new report from GuideStar found that the median compensation for female chief executives at nonprofits in 2012 trailed that of their male counterparts by as much as 23% depending on the organization’s size.
This has been going on for 14 consecutive years, according to GuideStar, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit that provides information on the programs, finances and impact of IRS-recognized nonprofit groups.
The report also found that female representation in the chief executive role declined as budget size increased. Only 17% of nonprofits with budgets exceeding $50 million were led by women in 2012.
By comparison, the majority of organizations with budgets of less than $1 million had female chief executives.
For its report, GuideStar analyzed key employee compensation across its database of digitized IRS Form 990 information for 501(c) organizations for fiscal year 2012. The report includes statistical compensation analysis for 14 executive-level job categories by gender, budget size, program area and geography as well as comparisons of year-over-year compensation increases for incumbent executives.
The report found that economic uncertainty continued to affect compensation increases in 2012, although salaries for chief executives who retained their positions had the highest percentage increase since 2008.
In 2012, median increases in incumbent CEO compensation were 2.2%, up from 2% in 2011 but still lagging prerecession numbers. In 2008, increases were generally 4% or higher.
“In 2012, there was a greater median increase in nonprofit CEO compensation compared to 2011, which is possibly a sign that the economic conditions started to improve for nonprofits,” GuideStar’s vice president of research, Chuck McLean, said in a statement.
“Female CEOs made 11% less on average at organizations with budgets of $250,000 or less, and 23% less at organizations with budgets between $25 million and $50 million,” McLean said.
“All of this tells us that the social sector has a long way to go to meet gender equity in executive compensation.”
