American CEOs getting super rich has a lot to do with stock buybacks

The wealthiest Americans own the vast majority of the stock market

Recent data from the Federal Reserve shows that the richest people in America own 93% of all the country's stock—the highest level ever recorded. Meanwhile, the bottom 50% of Americans held just 1% of all stocks.

Should companies be owned by their workers?

In the last half-century, so-called private equity has transformed industries by purchasing private companies, cutting costs, loading up debt, and then selling the business at a premium—all at a huge profit to the investors. Workers, on the other hand, are often left with nothing. Listen to how both pro-worker economists and a private equity stalwart are trying to shift ownership to workers—a growing tactic proven to improve worker satisfaction and company value.

Who are America's highest-paid CEOs?

As of 2024, Apple's Tim Cook, Starbucks' Brian Niccol, and Microsoft's Satya Nadella were among America's highest-paid CEOs, each making tens of millions of dollars per year.

Explore America’s top companies by revenue in 1994 versus 2023

America’s top companies by revenue have changed a lot in the past few decades. Sears, for instance, isn’t on the 2023 list, while Amazon isn’t in the 1994 edition.

Stock buybacks are when a company purchases some of its own shares of stock

This reduces the number of shares on the market and, therefore, makes the remaining shares more valuable. Buybacks have received a lot of criticism in recent years for many reasons, such as how they could artificially inflate share prices.

Ray Dalio argues that American capitalism is broken, citing economic factors like a growing wealth divide

Dalio also points to stalling income growth, weak healthcare systems, and poor educational outcomes when arguing that American capitalism needs serious reform. However, critics point out that Dalio has amassed a large fortune by running the world's largest hedge fund and question whether Dalio really wants economic reform.

As of 2021, 8.2% of Fortune 500 CEOs were women

Eighty-five percent of those women were white. A data visualization breaks down what the face of corporate America looks like, plus provides information about the history of female CEOs on the Fortune 500 list.

Family CEOs tend to prioritize a non-economic goal: keeping the business in the family

Companies led by family CEOs tend to prioritize corporate social responsibility, but they also tend to invest less in innovation and international growth. They also have more debt on average.

The average pay for family office executives has soared

As the number of family offices grows, they’re battling for top talent with traditional financial institutions by bulking up pay and incentive packages.

Part of the reason why American teachers aren't paid well has to do with gender

In the US, the wage gap between teachers and others with the same level of education and experience was nearly 20% as of 2021, per CNBC. That's partly because teaching was originally branded as a woman's profession.

Driving forces behind pay transparency laws

Since 2018, pay transparency laws have been enacted in more than a few states and cities across the US. But what’s driving the trend, from a legal perspective? This law review article attempts to answer that question, citing factors such as the Great Recession and the gender pay gap—click here to learn more.

Advertising-related activity may have supported roughly one in five American jobs as of 2024

That’s according to a study commissioned by The Advertising Coalition, conducted by S&P Global Market Intelligence, which also found that the advertising industry powered more than 20% of total US economic output at the time.

In 2025, American tech companies will spend $300B to $400B on AI

That is, in nominal dollars, more than any group of companies has ever spent to do anything. Notably, these companies are not remotely close to earning $400B on artificial intelligence.

The average American contributed nearly $6,000 to a 401(k) account in 2023

That's an increase over the previous year—and roughly 8% of their total income. When employer contributions are factored in, the total average contribution to 401(k) accounts rose to $8,618 in 2023, up from $8,362 in 2022 and $8,236 in 2021.

American Express is one of the top-ranked places to work in the US

In 2026, American Express came in eighth place in Forbes' annual ranking of the best large workplaces (meaning workplaces with more than 5,000 employees). It's the top-ranked finance company on the list. The rankings were determined by survey data that asked employees to anonymously rate the salary, opportunity for advancement, benefits, and workplace at their company.

More than 650 companies went public in the US in 1996

As the dot-com bubble reached its peak, most dot-com companies went public with little proof of being profitable and were often overvalued. In 1999, the Nasdaq's price-to-earnings ratio (a tool used to determine a stock's value that divides its price by earnings) hit 90.2, signaling that many companies were operating at a net loss. Startups promised investors that more time and money would help scale their businesses and become profitable.

Dozens of S&P 500 stocks, including Coca-Cola and Walmart—known as the dividend aristocrats—have increased dividends every year for 25 years

Warren Buffett turned a struggling textile mill into Berkshire Hathaway

With Class A shares trading at over $700K per share, Berkshire Hathaway's high stock price reflects Buffett's decades of long-term investing, major acquisitions, and a philosophy that has reshaped modern finance.

Housing prices have skyrocketed over the last 50 years

After adjusting for inflation, housing costs have more than doubled since 1965. And based on average incomes, buyers are spending more than five times their income for a home versus buyers in 1965, who typically spent less than three times their income.

Trade between the US and China has increased in recent decades

After China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, the trade partnership between the US and China bloomed. But it's not without pros and cons, including lower prices for US consumers and higher profits for US corporations alongside the loss of American jobs due to import competition and multinational companies moving overseas.

What a $1K investment in P&G stock 20 years ago would be worth today

If someone put $1K into P&G stock 20 years ago, it would be worth about $5.2K in 2025, making its annualized return about 8.6%. For context, the S&P 500 has had an annualized return of 10.7% over the same time period.

Asia-Pacific's share of global venture capital investment has jumped from 3% to 28% in 20 years

China has driven much of that growth due to its manufacturing power and tech sector. This graphic shows how the share of total venture capital deal value changed around the world between 1997 and 2023.

US consumers collectively owe more than $1T to credit card companies—almost as much as they owe in auto loans.

One dad, one hundred babies

A look at the companies offering surrogacy to the ultrarich—including Chinese men taking their reproductive cues from Elon Musk.

The Nasdaq's 'Magnificent 7' companies are responsible for roughly 40% of the Nasdaq 100 index's gains, while the remaining 93 companies account for the other 60%.

Europeans, on average, have double the amount of vacation time Americans have

Europeans average nearly double the amount of time off as their American counterparts. Why is that? It's due to a long history of European labor’s push for time off, including both left- and right-wing political groups that argued vacation could benefit their causes.

90 percent of active managers of large public funds underperform

High fees tend to eat away at whatever edge professional managers accrue, resulting in most such funds performing worse than their underlying benchmark indexes like the S&P 500.

A study followed a cohort of Black graduates beginning in the 1995–96 school year

While access to higher education led to improved outcomes across minority groups in the US, a significant gap exists in the average amount of debt held and the time it takes to pay back loans. This study found median Black borrowers still owed 95% of the principal two decades later.

The power and influence of the American presidency have expanded significantly over time—far beyond what the founders envisioned.

Hedge funds, the private investment firms that trade a wide swath of financial assets, make money by imposing steep fees on investors and from the fund's investment performance.

SpaceX's S-1 or 'prospectus' revealed many previously unknown details about the company, including its unprofitability despite doing $18.7B in revenue in 2025, exactly how many voting shares Elon Musk will have in the company (roughly 85%), and more.

Calculate how much of your tax dollars go to each federal program based on your income, filing status, and number of children

The American Society of Civil Engineers' infrastructure report card gave the US a C in 2025, its highest grade since the project launched in 1998.

Up to a million Girl Scouts sell about 200 million cookie boxes every spring, generating $800 million, largely because refusing a child is frowned upon

US housing costs have risen by roughly 175% between 1991 and 2026—but a growing number of Gen Zers are becoming homeowners anyway. In 2025, 4% of homebuyers were Gen Z, up from 3% the year before.

A Yale student wrote a profound essay about the consulting industry's influence on elite college students that was published in a book of her writing after she died in a post-graduation car accident.

See a ranking of the best (and worst) Federal Reserve Chairs since 1914 out of the 16 men and women who have held the office since.

Fast-casual restaurant Chili's is experiencing a resurgence, with its parent company recently reporting a nearly 32% increase in sales, thanks to passionate Gen Z fans on TikTok.

The name 'Silicon Valley' arose from the founding of Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in Fairchild Semiconductor in 1956-57, founded near Stanford University in Palo Alto

Louisiana's 'Cancer Alley' is infamous for having some of the highest industrial pollution, toxic air emissions, and cancer risks in the US.

Gerrymandering works through two techniques: cracking opposing voters across districts to dilute their power, and packing them into a few to waste their votes in lopsided majorities.

Fireworks-related ER visits are on the rise—in 2024, they increased by 52% as compared to the prior year.

Art theft is the third-largest source of criminal revenues worldwide, thanks in part to the subjective nature of valuing a work of art.

The most expensive ad of all time was for Chanel No. 5 perfume and cost roughly $33M to produce in 2004—about $57M in today's dollars.

Legendary architect Frank Lloyd Wright designed the SC Johnson headquarters in Wisconsin, aiming to make a cathedral-like workplace

Fish populations in the Great Barrier Reef have increased after installing waterproof speakers on the ocean floor that played recordings of sounds from healthy coral reefs.

The American cockroach is actually from Africa, an apparent hitchhiker aboard ships carrying enslaved people, with evidence suggesting the bug may have arrived in the New World as early as the 1600s.

Browse a detailed visual analysis of over 200,000 similes—comparisons that often use 'like' or 'as'—from popular fiction to see how frequently writers the same idiomatic expressions.

Studies suggest when you sleep is as important as how much you get, and syncing with your circadian rhythms may lead to less fatigue and improved long-term health outcomes

Quincy Jones' 'Big Band Bossa Nova' helped introduce bossa nova—a jazz-influenced Brazilian genre—to the US