How much should charity CEOs be paid?

The debate in brief

ACEVO's 2024 Pay and Equalities Survey found a median basic salary of £60,000 among responding sector leaders. At the UK's largest 100 charities, that figure rises to a median of £192,000 (Charity Finance, 2025). Both numbers are dwarfed by the private sector, where FTSE 100 CEOs take home a median of £4.4 million. Yet it is charity pay, not corporate pay, that triggers periodic public outrage — because charities run on donated money, and donors expect it to reach the people it was given for.

The sector has never settled this argument. One side says charities competing for talented leaders must pay accordingly or lose them. The other says six-figure salaries in organisations serving people in poverty erode the public trust on which the entire sector depends. Both sides have a point, and the evidence suggests neither is winning.

Quick takeaways

The arguments

The case for competitive pay

Running a large charity is genuinely demanding work. CEOs manage complex organisations with hundreds of staff, navigate heavy regulation from the Charity Commission, the Fundraising Regulator, and HMRC, and operate under a level of public scrutiny that most corporate leaders never face. The CEO-to-average-worker pay ratio in the charity sector runs at roughly 4:1. In the FTSE 100, it stands at 113:1 (High Pay Centre, 2025).

The talent argument is not abstract. The hourly wage gap between the charity sector and the wider economy stands at 7% and is widening, according to research by Pro Bono Economics for the Law Family Commission on Civil Society. Underpaying at the top does not only affect the CEO — it compresses the entire salary structure, making it harder to recruit and retain skilled staff at every level. The ICAEW argues that charities need executives with the skills to lead organisations operating in a heavily regulated environment, and that attracting those executives requires competitive pay.

The weakest point in this argument: it can become a justification for matching private sector pay without matching private sector accountability for results.

The case for restraint

Public trust is the charity sector's most valuable and most fragile asset. When a CEO earns multiples of what frontline staff take home — or multiples of what service users receive in support — it creates a distance that is hard to explain away with talk of market rates. Telegraph analysis of Charity Commission data showed the number of charity employees earning over £400,000 rose from 27 in 2019 to 44 in 2024. Each high-profile salary disclosure feeds a narrative that charities are spending donations on themselves rather than on their mission.

There is also a philosophical objection. People choose to work in charities in part because they are motivated by purpose rather than pay. Pro Bono Economics research for the Law Family Commission on Civil Society found that charity workers are more highly motivated by intrinsic rewards — such as the difference they make to beneficiaries — than by pay. If mission-driven motivation is real — and all the evidence says it is — then the sector should not pretend it does not exist when setting pay.

The weakest point in this argument: taken to its extreme, it implies charity leaders should accept below-market pay as a form of personal sacrifice, which excludes anyone who cannot afford to do so — disproportionately women, people of colour, and those without independent wealth.

The case for transparency over caps

The strongest position may be neither high pay nor low pay, but defensible pay. The NCVO's 2014 inquiry into charity senior executive pay, chaired by Martyn Lewis, recommended a "two clicks to clarity" approach: charities with income above £500,000 should publish the names, titles, and salaries of their highest-paid staff within two clicks of their homepage, accompanied by a trustee statement justifying the figure. The inquiry also recommended that charities consider publishing the ratio between their highest and median salaries.

This framing shifts the question from "how much?" to "can you justify it?" — which is arguably the right question for a sector where organisations range from two-person local groups to global operations with hundreds of millions in income. A single salary cap would be absurd. A universal expectation of transparency and justification is not.

The evidence

The most comprehensive data on charity CEO pay comes from the ACEVO Pay and Equalities Survey, conducted annually. The 2024 survey found a median basic salary of £60,000 among responding sector leaders. Pay varies sharply by organisation size: CEOs of charities with income under £1 million earn substantially less, while Charity Finance's 2025 survey found that chief executives at the UK's largest 100 charities had a median salary of £192,000.

The gender pay gap among charity CEOs remains significant. ACEVO's 2025 survey found a 10.6% gap, with male CEOs earning a median of £64,067 and female CEOs £57,250. The gap had widened sharply in 2024 to 14.4% — its highest since 2014 — before narrowing in 2025. Male median salaries have risen steadily; female median salaries grew less consistently and in some years declined.

Charities in England and Wales must report in their annual returns how many staff earn above £60,000, in £10,000 bandings up to £150,000 and £50,000 bandings thereafter. The Charity Commission publishes this data. The SORP (Statement of Recommended Practice) additionally requires disclosure of total remuneration for key management personnel.

One statistic worth sitting with: the entire debate about charity CEO pay concerns a tiny fraction of the sector. Fewer than 3% of registered charities in England and Wales have an annual income above £5 million — the threshold at which CEO pay typically exceeds £100,000. For the vast majority of charities, the CEO pay "controversy" has no bearing on their reality.

Current context

The debate flared again in late 2024 when the Telegraph published an analysis showing a sharp rise in very high charity salaries. Charity Commission CEO David Holdsworth responded that "large and complex charities must attract talented people to run them, but the public rightly expects the demands of executive jobs in charities to be balanced with the selflessness that underpins what it means to be charitable." He added that trustees are "legally bound to make prudent decisions on all charity spending, including pay, and if this line is crossed, we will take action."

ACEVO's 2025 Pay and Equalities Survey highlighted a different concern: not that CEO pay is too high, but that it is stagnating while the demands of the role intensify. The survey found that while 76% of CEOs received a salary increase in their current role (up from 68% in 2024), access to mental health support and wellness programmes was declining. The sector is asking more of its leaders while offering less support.

Meanwhile, the widening pay gap with the private sector is creating a structural recruitment problem. The charity sector pay discount — once accepted as the price of purposeful work — is increasingly cited as a barrier to diversity in leadership, since those who can afford to accept below-market pay are not representative of the population.

Last updated: April 2026

What this means for charities

For boards setting CEO pay, the practical question is not whether to pay more or less, but whether you can defend the figure you have chosen. That means having a formal remuneration process — ideally a remuneration committee — that benchmarks against comparable organisations, documents its reasoning, and publishes the outcome.

The risk of getting this wrong runs in both directions. Overpaying damages public trust and can attract regulatory attention. Underpaying narrows the field of candidates, contributes to a culture of burnout at the top, and compresses salaries throughout the organisation. Neither outcome serves beneficiaries.

Boards should also be honest about the gender pay gap in their own organisation. The ACEVO data suggests this is not just a sector-wide problem — it is reproduced in individual hiring and pay decisions. If your charity has never audited whether men and women in comparable roles are paid comparably, that is a governance gap.

Finally, transparency is not just a defence against criticism — it is a signal of confidence. Charities that publish their pay rationale proactively tend to face less scrutiny than those that disclose reactively under pressure.

Common questions

What is the average charity CEO salary in the UK?

ACEVO's 2024 Pay and Equalities Survey found a median basic salary of £60,000 among responding sector leaders. This figure has been broadly stable for several years. Pay varies considerably by organisation size: CEOs of charities with income under £1 million earn substantially less, while chief executives at the UK's largest 100 charities had a much higher median salary of £192,000 in Charity Finance's 2025 survey.

Do charity CEOs earn too much?

For most charities, the answer is clearly no. The sector's CEO-to-worker pay ratio runs at roughly 4:1, compared with 113:1 in the FTSE 100. The controversy concentrates on a small number of very large organisations: 44 charity employees earned over £400,000 in 2024, up from 27 in 2019. Whether those specific figures are excessive depends on the complexity of the role and whether trustees can justify the pay publicly — which is the test the Charity Commission applies.

Is there a gender pay gap in charity leadership?

Yes, and it is significant. The ACEVO 2025 survey found male charity CEOs earn a median of £64,067 against £57,250 for female CEOs — a gap of 10.6%. The gap had widened sharply in 2024 to 14.4%, its highest level since 2014, before narrowing in 2025. Male median salaries have risen steadily; female median salaries grew less consistently and in some years declined. The ACEVO data suggests this gap is reproduced in individual hiring and pay decisions across the sector, not just at the aggregate level.

How much should a charity spend on staff?

There is no single correct ratio of staff costs to total expenditure — it depends entirely on what the charity does. Service delivery organisations are naturally more staff-intensive than grant-making trusts. The more useful question is whether staffing costs, including senior pay, are openly reported, benchmarked against comparable organisations, and justified in trustees' reports. The NCVO's 2014 inquiry recommended charities publish pay ratios alongside a trustee statement explaining the reasoning — a standard that remains best practice.

What are the rules on reporting charity CEO pay?

Charities in England and Wales must report in their annual returns how many staff earn above £60,000, in £10,000 bandings up to £150,000 and £50,000 bandings above that. The Charity Commission publishes this data. The Charities SORP additionally requires disclosure of total remuneration for key management personnel in the trustees' annual report. For charities with income above £500,000, the NCVO inquiry recommended making this information accessible within two clicks of the homepage — the "two clicks to clarity" standard.

Key sources and further reading

• ACEVO Pay and Equalities Survey 2024 — ACEVO, November 2024. Annual survey of charity CEO pay and demographics. The 2024 survey found a median CEO salary of £60,000 and a gender pay gap of 14.4% — its highest since 2014.

• ACEVO Pay and Equalities Survey 2025 — ACEVO, November 2025. The most recent survey, finding a median CEO salary of £60,000, with male CEOs earning a median of £64,067 and female CEOs £57,250, a gap of 10.6%.

• Report of the Inquiry into Charity Senior Executive Pay — NCVO, 2014. The foundational sector inquiry, chaired by Martyn Lewis, recommending the "two clicks to clarity" transparency approach.

• Dispelling Common Myths About Charities: Myth 3 — ICAEW, July 2023. Evidence-based rebuttal of the claim that charities spend too much on executives, with useful contextual data.

• Charity Chief Executive Pay Inquiry: Written Evidence — Public Administration Select Committee, UK Parliament. Collection of evidence submissions from sector bodies on charity executive pay.

• The Price of Purpose? Pay Gaps in the Charity Sector — Pro Bono Economics for the Law Family Commission on Civil Society, 2022. Research on the widening pay gap between the charity sector and the wider economy, and its implications for diversity.

• Charity Commission Annual Return Regulations 2024 — GOV.UK, 2024. The regulatory framework for salary reporting, including the £60,000 banding thresholds.

• Charity Finance 100 Index: CEO Pay — Charity Finance, 2025. Annual analysis of CEO pay at the UK's largest 100 charities by income.