The Marx Ratio: Not Clear Karl Would be Happy

Neil Irwin had an interesting Upshot piece in the NYT that takes advantage of new data on the median worker's pay at major corporations. The piece calculates the "Marx ratio" which is the ratio of profits per worker to the median worker's pay. It shows this number for each of the companies who have released data on their ratio of CEO pay to median worker's pay, as required by a provision of the Dodd-Frank financial reform act.

It's not clear exactly what this ratio is giving us. Suppose that...