The Carter’s NOligarchy Profile
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Carter’s earns a NOligarchy Score of 70.95 out of 100 — a middling grade for a children’s clothing brand that quietly runs a lobbying operation focused almost entirely on trade policy, pays its chief executive 542 times what its median worker earns, and has channeled more than $222 million to shareholders over the two most recently reported fiscal years, all while carrying a clean regulatory record.
Current Pillar Scores
Political Access
70.7
Wealth Extraction
49.4
Playing by the Rules
100.0
Score history — 23 quarters
Tier bands show where each quarter's score falls — no numeric y-axis needed. The dashed ring marks the year-over-year comparison point. Tap any quarter but the first to see its pillar breakdown.
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Political Access Grade: 70.66/100. Carter’s spent $90,000 on federal lobbying from Q3 2024 through Q2 2026 (8 quarters — the two-year tracking period), concentrating every dollar on a single issue: trade. No Political Action Committee (PAC) spending was reported, and no executive political contributions appear on the public record.
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Wealth Extraction Grade: 49.0/100. The gap between what Carter’s CEO earns and what its median employee takes home is stark — a 542-to-1 ratio. Over the two most recently reported fiscal years, more than $222 million flowed to shareholders through buybacks and dividends, while the median worker earned just $13,844 a year.
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Playing by the Rules Grade: 100/100. No regulatory fines or penalties appear on the public record — a clean sheet in a sector where violations are common.
Carter’s ranks 11th out of 23 companies in the Clothing and clothing accessories retailers sector. Its overall score of 70.95 sits just above the sector average of 69.7 — a narrow margin that places Carter’s slightly ahead of the industry midpoint rather than comfortably above it.
The Bottom Line: A Brand Built on Babies, a Pay Gap Built for Executives
Carter’s generated $2.9 billion in annual revenue according to its SEC EDGAR 10-K (CIK 0001060822), yet the median Carter’s employee earns just $13,844 per year — less than $1,200 a month before taxes. Over the two most recently reported fiscal years, the company chose to send more than $222 million to shareholders through stock buybacks and dividends, while that median salary sat at poverty level. Carter’s has not been fined or penalized by regulators during the period tracked, which is genuinely commendable, but a clean legal record does not close a pay gap that leaves frontline workers earning poverty-level wages while the CEO pockets $7.5 million annually.
Spending Quietly to Shape the Rules of Global Trade
Carter’s is not a heavyweight in Washington — $90,000 in total federal lobbying spend across Q3 2024 through Q2 2026 is a modest sum by corporate standards — but the precision of where that money went tells a sharper story. Every single lobbying filing the company made targeted one issue area: Trade (domestic/foreign). Carter’s hired one outside firm, Sorini Strategic Advisors (formerly Sorini, Samet & Associates, LLC), which also lobbies for fashion competitor Tapestry Inc. That shared firm is a notable detail: two competing apparel companies paying the same lobby shop to work the same halls.
Shared Lobbying Exposure
Carter's
client
SORINI STRATEGIC ADVISORS F/K/A SORINI, SAMET, & ASSOCIATES, LLC
lobbying firm
Tapestry Inc
also a client
Why it matters: the same firm argues Carter's’s case and its rivals’ — one hire buys a web of shared access that can’t be seen from outside. This network worsens Carter's’s political-access score (see methodology for the exact factor).
For the first seven quarters of the tracking period, Carter’s spent a consistent $10,000 per quarter. Then in Q2 2026 — as tariff fights intensified — that figure doubled to $20,000, pushing the 2026 tally to $30,000 in just two quarters. That escalation signals a company growing more anxious about trade policy outcomes, not less.
Carter’s lobbyists knocked on doors at both chambers of Congress — the House of Representatives and the Senate each logged five contacts — as well as the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR), the International Trade Administration (ITA), and U.S. Customs & Border Protection. These are precisely the offices that set tariff schedules, manage trade agreements, and administer the rules that determine how much Carter’s pays to import children’s clothing manufactured abroad.
The filing descriptions are direct about the subject matter. Lobbyists repeatedly cited the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) renewal, tariff policy under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), and — most recently — IEEPA tariff collection following a Supreme Court ruling on U.S. Free Trade Zones (FTZs). Carter’s sources the vast majority of its products from overseas factories. GSP grants duty-free status to goods imported from certain developing countries — its renewal or lapse directly affects how much Carter’s pays at the border. The FTZ ruling adds another live front: a Supreme Court decision that reshapes how tariff collection applies to goods processed inside U.S. trade zones, with direct cost implications for any company that imports at scale.
Carter’s spent nothing through a corporate PAC — confirmed zero. No executive political contributions appear in Federal Election Commission (FEC) records for this period.
FEDERAL CONTACT LOG
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
5
≈ every 100th business day
SENATE
5
≈ every 100th business day
U.S. Trade Representative (USTR)
5
≈ every 100th business day
Intl Trade Administration (ITA)
2
≈ every 250th business day
U.S. Customs & Border Protection
1
≈ every 500th business day
5 federal bodies named in federal lobbying filings · 2024-Q3–2026-Q2
Between 2024-Q3 and 2026-Q2, Carter's was named in lobbying filings reaching 5 federal bodies — from HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES to SENATE.
A $13,844 Wage Floor Beneath a $7.5 Million Penthouse
The most arresting number in Carter’s public disclosures is the chasm between what its workers earn and what its chief executive pockets. The CEO pay ratio is 542:1, per the company’s SEC DEF 14A. The CEO’s total compensation in the most recent reported fiscal year was about $7.5 million. The median Carter’s employee earned $13,844 in the same period — a figure that barely clears the federal poverty line for a family of two and falls below it for a family of three or four.
CEO — MEDIAN-PAY MARKER
JANUARY
9:00
10:00
11:00
12:00
12:50 PM — a median year, earned
1:00
passes the median employee’s full annual pay
12:50 PM · January 1
542× the median employee’s pay
At 542:1, Carter's's CEO earns the median employee's entire annual pay by 12:50 PM on the first workday of the year.
Over the two most recently reported fiscal years, Carter’s chose to send substantial sums to shareholders through two channels. In fiscal 2024, it executed a deliberate reduction in shares outstanding that inflates per-share metrics and triggers executive performance bonuses — spending $50,526,000 on buybacks, per the SEC 10-K. In fiscal 2025, buybacks stopped entirely. Dividend payments continued across both years: $116,178,000 in fiscal 2024 and $56,359,000 in fiscal 2025 — a drop of more than half year over year. In total, more than $222 million left the company for shareholders over those two fiscal years, directed to the wealthiest 10% of Americans, who own 93% of the stock market.
Carter’s does not publicly disclose how many people it employs, so a precise calculation of what that shareholder outflow could have meant per worker cannot be computed. What the scale alone makes clear: the $116 million handed to shareholders in a single dividend year dwarfs what any realistic workforce would cost to give a meaningful pay increase — the company simply chose not to.
Carter’s ran buybacks and dividends simultaneously through fiscal 2024. That is a deliberate choice: the company generated enough cash to fund both programs for investors. What it chose not to fund was a meaningful wage floor for the workers who stock its shelves, staff its stores, and fulfill its online orders.
When Carter’s buys back its own stock, that reduction in outstanding shares mechanically lifts earnings per share — a key metric tied to performance bonuses for senior executives. With the CEO earning 542 times the median worker’s salary, those bonuses land in a very different tax bracket than the paychecks of the people folding onesies.
A Clean Record on the Public Docket
Carter’s carries no regulatory fines or penalties on the public record tracked here — no labor violations, no consumer protection settlements, no environmental citations. In a sector where wage theft citations and safety violations are routine, that absence is worth acknowledging. A perfect 100/100 on this pillar is not handed out often.
No public subsidy data was recorded for Carter’s during this period.