Pay Predictor methodology
One permanent address for how every figure on Pay Predictor is made. The same text sits in the Methodology tab of the calculator.
Pay Predictor · model v1.3.3 · Estimates as of 30 June 2026, aged at 4% a year · Michael Oak Advisors
What this is
Pay Predictor produces model estimates of compensation for investment and investment-operations roles at endowments and foundations. That is the whole of what this tool covers. It is a proprietary Michael Oak Advisors model informed by public data: IRS Forms 990 and job postings that publish compensation ranges. Roles, pay definitions, time periods, organization scale, geography and other relevant operating characteristics are normalized before estimates are developed.
Compensation disclosures for other institutions are published on this site as datasets rather than as estimates: non-profit pay from Forms 990 at /990, listed asset manager executive and director pay from SEC proxy statements at /proxy, and Canadian public fund named-executive pay at /canada. Those pages report what organizations disclosed. This page models what an endowment or foundation would pay.
Every figure is a model estimate
It is a model estimate based on the assumptions shown. It is not a compensation survey, an observed market percentile, or a valuation of an individual. Model estimates are directional and may vary significantly from results in trusted, professionally administered compensation surveys. They should be considered alongside organization-specific context and judgment. No client data was used in the model's development or validation.
What the figures are
Each table shows, for every role on the segment's ladder, an estimated P10, estimated P25, estimated median (P50), estimated P75 and estimated P90 for each pay basis the segment supports. The median is the model's central estimate for the assumptions chosen. The other percentiles describe a symmetric spread around it using standard normal positions; they are not observed dispersion among named organizations. Figures are rounded to the nearest $5,000.
| Pay basis | What the dollars are |
|---|---|
| Base Salary Only | Annual base salary. |
| Base + Target Incentive | Base salary plus the target annual incentive. |
| Base + Realized (LFY) | Base salary plus the incentive actually earned for the last fiscal year, which for a good year sits above target. |
| Base + Maximum Incentive | Base salary plus the maximum annual incentive opportunity. |
Effective date and ageing
Estimates are as of 30 June 2026. Model anchors are aged forward at 4% a year, applied as a half-year from the model's 1 January base. The Michael Oak Advisors model workbook, published at /downloads, uses the same convention and reproduces these figures cell for cell.
The observed Form 990 line beside an estimate is aged to the same date at the same 4%, from one year before each filing's fiscal year end, because pay reported for a fiscal year is earned across that year.
Roles and inputs
The scales below are the model's own anchor definitions; 3 is the typical peer implementation.
| Calculation family | Inputs that move the estimate | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| Per-level opportunity-curve model: a power curve on assets, with location and complexity adjustments | Assets under management $1B to $50B; investment complexity 1 (passive / outsourced CIO) to 5 (full institutional platform); market location; operations pay authority | Analyst, Sr. Analyst, Associate, Sr. Assoc / Manager, Director / Sr. Mgr, MD, Sr. MD / Deputy CIO, CIO; operations Analyst to COO |
Market locations offered: National Average, New York City, San Francisco, Boston, Washington DC, and Dallas / Atlanta. Location and complexity adjustments are model parameters and are not published.
Interpolated roles, exclusions and pay authority
- L7 (Sr. MD / Deputy CIO) is interpolated between L6 and L8; no direct empirical data.
- Operations pay authority (none, some, full) scales the operations ladder's incentive opportunity only; investment roles are unaffected. The default is some.
How senior incentive is calibrated
For the MD and the CIO, the incentive curve is fitted to realized pay reported on IRS Form 990 Schedule J. For each person, incentive is adjusted total compensation less nontaxable benefits, taken as a multiple of base salary, placed at that organization's own investment assets and read from its most recent filing. The fit follows the median at each asset size, and target and maximum incentive are set from the same curve. The CIO is each organization's top investment executive. The MD is senior investment staff reporting to a CIO; associate and analyst titles, and organizations whose filing names no top investment executive, are left out. Sr. MD / Deputy CIO has no filings of its own and sits on a curve between the two. Director and below, and every base salary, keep their earlier calibration.
Form 990-PF and Part VII records carry no split between base and incentive, so they are not used in the fit. Schedule J's retirement and other deferred column mixes employer retirement contributions with deferred incentive, which the filing cannot separate; it is kept in whole.
The estimate does not follow every filed figure. Peer groups at neighboring asset sizes share most of their organizations, so a few large offices entering a group can lift its median sharply from one size to the next, and no smooth curve follows every step. The estimate runs above filed CIO pay around $5 billion, below filed MD pay around $8 to $9 billion, and below filed CIO pay from about $9 billion, where most of the difference is base salary.
Change, 16 September 2026
MD, Sr. MD / Deputy CIO and CIO incentive were recalibrated as described above. No base salary and no other role moved. Base + Realized median, National Average, complexity 3:
| Role | Assets | Before | After | Form 990 median, aged |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MD | $1B | $735,000 | $535,000 | not published |
| MD | $5B | $1,135,000 | $810,000 | not published |
| MD | $10B | $1,440,000 | $1,035,000 | not published |
| Sr. MD / Deputy CIO | $1B | $930,000 | $660,000 | not published |
| Sr. MD / Deputy CIO | $5B | $1,455,000 | $1,080,000 | not published |
| Sr. MD / Deputy CIO | $10B | $1,850,000 | $1,440,000 | not published |
| CIO | $1B | $1,085,000 | $740,000 | $732,610 (58 filings) |
| CIO | $5B | $2,205,000 | $1,570,000 | $1,402,511 (62 filings) |
| CIO | $10B | $3,175,000 | $2,385,000 | $3,049,728 (30 filings) |
Validation against public filings
Validation runs on publicly available disclosures only. No industry survey is used as a validation benchmark. Endowments and foundations file IRS Form 990, which is the deepest disclosure regime available for this population and the reason it is the segment published here.
Form 990 regression
A log-log regression of top investment executive pay on endowment assets, computed from the Form 990 data published at /990: one point per endowment, its highest-paid top investment executive at its latest filing, adjusted total compensation as filed, against its investment assets. The slope reads directly as an elasticity. Separate investment management companies and every other filer are included as they file.
| Statistic | Value | Interpretation |
|---|---|---|
| Endowments | 103 | One point each, from Form 990 snapshot 990-2026-09-16-3de263dd |
| Intercept (α) | −0.463 | Implied pay at $1b of assets: $0.6m |
| Slope / elasticity (β) | 0.589 | Percent change in top investment executive pay per percent change in assets |
| R² | 67% | Share of variance in ln(pay) explained by ln(assets) |
A 10% increase in assets implies roughly 5.8% higher pay; the line reads $0.6m at $1b and $2.4m at $10b, and assets explain about 67% of the variance.
Public data behind the model
Coverage of the public sources behind this model, as published with this model version: five or more years of disclosures plus current-year job-posting data.
| Coverage | Sources |
|---|---|
| 150+ non-profit investment offices · 25,000+ records | IRS 990 Schedule J · job postings |
Disclosed executive-year records, job postings, government-pay records and organizations are different units and are not summed. Job-posting ranges are hiring ranges, often broad and often base salary only; Forms 990, SEC proxies and Canadian disclosures use different pay definitions, timing and named populations; government payroll sources may omit deferred pay, pension value, incentives or role context. Posted or disclosed compensation is observable evidence, not a random sample of the labor market, and the sources are not directly comparable without the normalization described above.
Parity with the model workbook
The browser engine and its coefficient file are byte-identical copies of the calculator that Michael Oak Advisors has served since the model's release, and a golden parity test against the Python model, itself verified cell for cell against the model workbook, runs before every release. The workbook published at /downloads carries this same Endowment & Foundation calculator and returns the same figures for the same inputs. Exact equations, coefficients, anchor tables and parameter sheets are proprietary and are not published.
Explore the underlying disclosures
The disclosures behind this model, and the disclosures for institutions this model does not cover, are published on this site as datasets in their own right:
- Non-profit compensation (Form 990) — the records this model is built and validated on.
- Listed asset manager executive and director pay — from SEC proxy statements.
- Canadian public fund executive pay — from each fund's annual report and CD&A.
Those pages report what organizations disclosed, as disclosed. They are not model estimates and they are not produced by this tool.