Categories: OLD Media Moves

Highest-paid CEOs and media coverage

Forbes list of America’s highest paid executives showcases who has the biggest pocketbooks, but do these CEOs also receive the most press?

The answer to that is no. Using the online research tool, HighBeam Research, the media attention of the Forbes Top Ten List was measured to indicate which CEO receives both money and media.

We took the stats or number of media mentions each CEO received. After receiving the raw number for each CEO, we divided it by the total media mentions of the 10 highest paid CEOs to quantify the numbers into percentages.

CEO (Company)	Forbes Ranking	Media Attention
Ralph Lauren (Ralph Lauren)	2	43.12%
George Paz (Express Scripts)	6	18.35%
John Martin (Gilead Sciences)	10	17.43%
Stephen Hemsley (UnitedHealth Group)	8	8.26%
Clarence Cazalot (Marathon Oil)	9	5.50%
Michael Fascitelli (Vornado Realty)	3	2.75%
David Cote (Honeywell)	5	2.75%
John Hammergren (McKesson)	1	< 1%
Richard Kinder (Kinder Morgan)	4	< 1%
Jeffery Boyd (Priceline.com)	7	< 1%

When it comes to bringing home a big check and receiving plenty of media coverage, designer Ralph Lauren receives the CEO crown with over 43 percent media coverage and a No. 2 Forbes ranking.

Express Scripts CEO George Paz received more than 18 percent media attention despite receiving a sixth place ranking in terms of his paycheck. Although John Hammergren of McKesson was No. 1 in terms of compensation, he received minimal media coverage with less than 1 percent.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.