The DSW NOligarchy Profile
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DSW earns a NOligarchy Score of 83.05 out of 100 — a number that looks reassuring until you understand what it hides. The score climbs because DSW spent nothing on lobbying and collected no regulatory fines from Q3 2024 through Q2 2026 (8 quarters — the two-year tracking period). But drag the lens down to where workers actually live, and the picture darkens fast: a CEO collecting nearly 500 times the pay of a median DSW employee is the sharpest edge in this data.
Current Pillar Scores
Political Access
96.9
Wealth Extraction
44.4
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: 96.94/100. This near-perfect score reflects a company that filed zero federal lobbying disclosures and operated no Political Action Committee (PAC) during the two-year period. One executive wrote a $1,000 personal campaign check, but that is the full extent of what is visible in the public record.
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Wealth Extraction Grade: 44.07/100. This is the lowest score in the profile — and the one that demands the most attention. It reflects a CEO pay ratio of 493 times the median worker salary, alongside a buyback history that sent tens of millions of dollars to shareholders before going quiet.
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Playing by the Rules Grade: 100/100. No regulatory fines. No public violations on record. DSW’s compliance record is clean, at least on the public docket.
DSW ranks 8th out of 12 companies in the Shoe retailers sector. The sector average sits at 81.5 — DSW edges just above it, but that marginal separation offers little comfort when the gap in its Wealth Extraction score is what drags the overall number down and keeps it near the middle of the pack.
The Bottom Line: A Clean Compliance Sheet Cannot Cover a 493-to-1 Pay Gap
DSW made a deliberate choice about how to distribute the value its workers produce. The company pulled in $2.89 billion in annual revenue — yet its median employee took home just $16,050 for a full year’s work, an amount that falls below the federal poverty line for a family of two. Meanwhile, the person at the very top collected nearly $8 million. DSW’s lobbyists filed nothing and its PAC spent nothing, which earns it credit — but political restraint does not change what happens at the paycheck level.
No Footprint in Washington
DSW is, on the lobbying front, essentially invisible. The Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act (LDA) filings show zero dollars in federal lobbying spend across the full two-year period — no registered lobbyists, no outside firms retained. The company operates no PAC, and no PAC contributions are recorded.
The only political money that shows up anywhere in the data is a single $1,000 personal contribution from a DSW executive in the third quarter of 2024, documented in Federal Election Commission (FEC) records. That is not a corporate strategy — it is one person writing one check.
For a company operating at nearly $3 billion in annual sales, this absence of Washington infrastructure is genuinely notable. DSW generated $2.89 billion, representing 4.4% of the shoe retailers market — a Challenger-tier player — with obvious reasons to track legislation on trade tariffs affecting imported footwear, retail labor standards, or consumer protection rules. Whether DSW is simply choosing not to play that game, or whether it is working through trade associations whose filings sit outside this data, is not visible in the public record.
A 493-to-1 Pay Gap That Tells the Whole Story
This is where DSW’s profile goes from comfortable to uncomfortable.
The CEO’s Take: The CEO pay ratio is 493:1, drawn directly from the SEC DEF 14A. For every dollar a typical DSW employee earned last year, the CEO pocketed $493. The CEO’s total compensation in the most recent reported fiscal year was about $7.9 million. To match that figure, a median DSW worker would need to clock in every day for nearly five centuries.
That $16,050 annual figure is not a part-time rate presented as a gotcha — it is the company’s own disclosed median worker compensation, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). At that level, a worker is bringing home roughly $1,338 a month before taxes. In most of the cities where DSW operates stores, that does not cover rent.
CEO — MEDIAN-PAY MARKER
JANUARY
9:00
10:00
11:00
12:00
1:00
1:13 PM — a median year, earned
2:00
passes the median employee’s full annual pay
1:13 PM · January 1
493× the median employee’s pay
At 493:1, DSW's CEO earns the median employee's entire annual pay by 1:13 PM on the first workday of the year.
The Shareholder Payout: No dividend data is recorded for DSW during the covered period. But the buyback history tells its own story. According to SEC 10-K filings, DSW spent $68.6 million buying back its own stock in fiscal year 2024 — equivalent to 2.3% of its annual revenue — then pulled that program to zero in fiscal year 2025. Each of those purchases was a deliberate reduction in shares outstanding that inflates per-share metrics and triggers executive performance bonuses, concentrating gains in the hands of large institutional holders and insiders who timed their exits.
The Missed Raise: No employee headcount is publicly disclosed for DSW, which means a precise per-worker calculation is not possible — the data to run that math simply is not there. What is visible is the scale: $68.6 million channeled into share repurchases in a single fiscal year while median worker pay sat at $16,050. That gap is not an accounting footnote. It is a structural decision about who the company prioritizes.
Buybacks Over Dividends: By concentrating shareholder returns entirely in buybacks rather than traditional dividends, DSW chose a more targeted instrument. Dividends flow broadly to anyone holding shares; buybacks concentrate their effect on per-share price, disproportionately benefiting those with the scale and timing to extract the most — executives included. The same executives who approved the buyback program also benefit when a deliberate reduction in shares outstanding pushes Earnings Per Share (EPS) higher and triggers the performance bonuses attached to their compensation packages. That loop — approved by the board, disclosed in filings, perfectly legal — is worth naming plainly.
A Clean Record on the Public Docket
DSW has no regulatory fines on the public record and no recorded violations during the two-year period or in the Good Jobs First database. No subsidies appear in the public record either.
A perfect score here is genuinely meaningful. Many retailers DSW’s size carry a trail of wage-and-hour settlements, consumer protection penalties, or environmental citations. DSW’s public docket is clear. That is worth crediting.