These 18 big companies made more than $250,000 in profit per employee last year

One U.S. financial giant earned nearly $2 million for every worker.

BY
BRIAN O’KEEFE
AND NICOLAS RAPP

August 10, 2020 4:30 AM EDT

Saudi Aramco’s Tanajib oil complex on the coast of the Arabian Gulf. The company is the profit leader in the Global 500 with $88 billion and has 79,000 employeesCOURTESY OF SAUDI ARAMCO

The world’s 500 biggest companies employ some 69.9 million people and together earned a total of $2.06 trillion last year. That translates to roughly $29,500 for each worker. But the 18 companies in the graphic above, concentrated in a handful of industries, proved vastly more efficient than average at making profits per employee. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the U.S. government-sponsored mortgage lenders, earned a combined $21.4 billion with a total of just 14,300 workers. Meanwhile, Saudi Aramco, the profit leader in the Global 500 with $88 billion, has 79,000 employees. Bigger isn’t always more profitable, though. Gold jewelry retailer Rajesh Exports of India produced $170 million in profits with the smallest workforce in the 500: a mere 409 employees.

A version of this article appears in the August/September 2020 issue of Fortune with the headline "Making the most of their workforce."

– Bob