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The WSJ piece, like similar stories on executive comp, focuses on pay data for a small and elite group of chiefs. In this case, it’s the leaders of S&P 500 companies—just 21 of whom are female. Given that sample size, it’s difficult to draw any real conclusions by comparing median male comp to median female comp. (If you do want to compare salaries by gender, Fast Company‘s Kathleen Davis points out that the top-earning male CEO still out-earns the highest-paid woman—by about $63 million.) And those few women who do make it to the top? “They must be exceptional,” Heidi Hartman, president of the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, tells Lublin.