Instead of focusing on distributing CEO pay to the rest of the company--where I think your math is off--consider things like annual bonuses for employees that a

Instead of focusing on distributing CEO pay to the rest of the company--where I think your math is off--consider things like annual bonuses for employees that are affected by company performance. Something like "you get $20k, or a little less if you or the company is doing poorly, or a little more if you and the company are doing well." Pretty common among developers. When those come in at 90% or 95% of target based on company performance, and yet the CEO still takes home tens of millions, that's when what seems like a tiny thing on a raw number basis, a matter of $2k for a single employee, can seem like a large thing. As an employee who performed well is still feeling the impact of company performance that fell short of expectations, probably on the basis of nothing the employee did, probably more attributably to the CEO (who helped set the expectations, and is more likely to have had a material impact on the result), it's natural for employees to at least wonder why the impact seems to be falling more on them. That kind of thing is very common, not a super-rare case.