The Kohl’s NOligarchy Profile
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Kohl’s earned a NOligarchy Score of 55.95 out of 100 — for a company that generated $15.5 billion in annual revenue, enough to rank it as one of America’s largest department store chains. The score is dragged down almost entirely by one factor: a catastrophic pay gap between the executive suite and the sales floor, compounded by hundreds of millions in dividend payments flowing overwhelmingly to the wealthiest Americans, and a tax strategy that consistently lands below the rate Congress set.
Current Pillar Scores
Political Access
71.1
Wealth Extraction
5.9
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: 71.14/100. Kohl’s spent $80,000 on federal lobbying — all in 2024 — and reported no Political Action Committee (PAC) contributions whatsoever from Q3 2024 through Q2 2026 (8 quarters — the two-year tracking period). The score reflects a modest but real footprint in Washington, with one registered lobbying firm and at least one former government insider on the payroll.
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Wealth Extraction Grade: 5.54/100. This is the worst score among Kohl’s three pillars — by a wide margin. The near-zero grade is anchored by a CEO-to-worker pay gap of 593 to one, in a retail workforce where midpoint earnings barely clear $15,000 annually, combined with $278 million in dividend payments channeled to shareholders across the two tracked fiscal years.
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Playing by the Rules Grade: 100/100. No regulatory fines or legal violations are recorded during the covered period. This is the strongest pillar by a significant margin.
Kohl’s ranks 7 out of 7 companies in the Department Stores sector — dead last, trailing a sector average score of 73.4 by more than 17 points. For a company of its scale, Kohl’s underperforms every peer in the industry on the accountability measures NOligarchy tracks.
The Single Most Revealing Number: A CEO Worth 593 Workers — and $278 Million Out the Door
In the most recently reported fiscal year, the median Kohl’s employee — folding jeans, scanning bar codes, managing fitting rooms — earned $15,859. Their chief executive took home about $9.4 million. The gap between those two figures — 593 to one — is not a rounding error or an abstraction: it means the CEO pocketed in a single year what 593 frontline workers collectively earned. Meanwhile, Kohl’s handed shareholders $222 million in dividends in fiscal year 2024 and another $56 million in fiscal year 2025 — that’s $278 million in two years flowing predominantly to the wealthiest Americans, who own the overwhelming share of stock market assets. Kohl’s pulled in $15.5 billion in revenue, yet the workers generating that activity were compensated at a level that, in many states, qualifies as below a living wage. The company chose to let that gap stand while writing nine-figure checks to investors.
A Quiet Hand in Washington
Kohl’s isn’t the loudest voice in the Capitol hallways. During the two-year tracking period from Q3 2024 through Q2 2026, the company channeled $80,000 into federal lobbying — all of it concentrated in the third and fourth quarters of 2024, $40,000 per quarter, with nothing recorded afterward. For a $15.5 billion retailer, that is a modest investment in political influence.
The lobbying was handled through a single outside firm, and the Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act (LDA) filings name five issue areas — each one connecting directly to where Kohl’s business faces friction: apparel and textile regulations that affect what the company can import and how it must label products; consumer data security rules that govern how Kohl’s handles the payment and personal information of millions of shoppers; tax provisions affecting retail-sector accounting; banking regulations touching the company’s own branded credit card program; and tariffs and trade agreements that set the cost of goods sourced overseas. These are not peripheral policy questions. Each of these issue areas directly affects Kohl’s ability to source cheaply, sell profitably, and manage its exposure to federal oversight.
No specific legislation was cited in any of the LDA filings — only the broad topic areas. What is on the record is that Kohl’s lobbyists contacted both the House of Representatives and the Senate repeatedly across both quarters.
FEDERAL CONTACT LOG
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
10
≈ every 50th business day
SENATE
10
≈ every 50th business day
2 federal bodies named in federal lobbying filings · 2024-Q3–2026-Q2
Between 2024-Q3 and 2026-Q2, Kohl's was named in lobbying filings reaching 2 federal bodies — from HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES to SENATE.
No PAC contributions were reported during this period.
One of Kohl’s eight registered lobbyists is a revolving-door hire: David Heil, who previously served as a congressional staffer to Congressman Sam Johnson. Former Hill staff don’t just know how to navigate Washington — they know the people. That institutional network is part of what a company buys when it retains a lobbying firm.
A CEO Earning 593 Times the Worker at the Register — While $278 Million Goes to Investors
The starkest number in Kohl’s public filings is not found in its revenue reports or balance sheets. It is found in its compensation disclosures. The CEO pay ratio is 593:1, as reported in the SEC DEF 14A. The CEO’s total compensation in the most recent reported fiscal year was about $9.4 million. The median Kohl’s employee earned $15,859.
To make that concrete: a full-time Kohl’s worker earning at the company’s disclosed midpoint would need to work 593 years to match what the chief executive was paid in twelve months.
Kohl’s recorded no stock buybacks in the most recently tracked fiscal year, according to SEC 10-K filings. What Kohl’s did instead was pour cash into dividends: $222 million in fiscal year 2024 and $56 million in fiscal year 2025 — a combined $278 million paid out to shareholders over the two tracked fiscal years. Those payments went overwhelmingly to the wealthiest Americans, the top 10% of earners who own roughly 93% of all stock market assets. Traditional dividends distribute cash broadly to shareholders, but the beneficiaries remain concentrated at the top of the wealth ladder. The buyback lever — a deliberate reduction in shares outstanding that inflates per-share metrics and triggers executive performance bonuses — was not pulled in the tracked period, but the executive team whose salary already stands at 593 times the median worker’s take-home pay retains the option.
Tax Choices Below the Statutory Floor
Kohl’s paid an effective tax rate of 19.0% — 2.0 percentage points below the 21% federal statutory rate that Congress set. The company’s own 10-K discloses the largest tax-cutting mechanisms at work: tax credits reduced the effective rate by 3.0 percentage points, changes in unrecognized tax benefits shaved off a further 2.1 percentage points, and other adjustments contributed an additional 2.9 percentage points in reductions. These cuts were partially offset by state and local income taxes — the 10-K identifies Texas, New York, Illinois, California, and Michigan as the states making up the bulk of that effect — adding back 3.3 percentage points. The filing also discloses that the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, enacted July 4, 2025, makes permanent full expensing for domestic research and development expenditures and capital investments, but that Kohl’s determined these provisions do not materially change its effective rate. Separately, the company carries a long-term income tax receivable of $258 million — the majority of which represents the cash benefit of a 2020 net operating loss the government has not yet returned.
Statutory federal rate
21%
This company
19%
Kohl's's effective federal tax rate was 19% against the 21% statutory rate — 2 percentage points drained away.
Kohl’s chose to pay 2.0 percentage points less than the rate Congress set. That gap is not an accounting accident — it is a structural decision that shifts real tax burden off Kohl’s balance sheet and onto everyone else. On top of that, Kohl’s holds Unrecognized Tax Benefits equal to 50% of its pre-tax income — contested deductions it has claimed on its taxes that the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has not yet agreed are valid. When half of the company’s pre-tax income sits in a disputed tax position, the 19% effective rate headline understates the full picture of what Kohl’s has claimed but not yet been required to pay.
A Clean Enforcement Record — and a Small Government Handout on the Side
No regulatory fines or legal violations are recorded for Kohl’s over the two-year tracking period from Q3 2024 through Q2 2026. The public enforcement record is empty during this period, and the Playing by the Rules score reflects that.
What the record does show is that in 2024, governments handed Kohl’s approximately $176,508 in public subsidies across three separate grants, according to the Good Jobs First Subsidy Tracker. The largest single grant was $146,298. The program names and granting agencies are not identified in the public subsidy tracking data — meaning which public purposes were served and who authorized the awards is not visible from what has been disclosed.