Originally By TCAP / May 24, 2025
Jennifer Rumsey hauled in an estimated £15 million ($19.1 million) last year. Not some dodgy rumour from a backstreet boozer. It’s pieced together from Cummins’ 2024 proxy filings and salary reports, like the ones on Salary.com. Fifteen million to captain a company that got hammered with a £1.3 billion ($1.65 billion) fine for an emissions scandal, then tried to tart it up with guff about “inclusive leadership.” It’s enough to make your ale taste like regret.
In India, Cummins operators — the blokes and lasses keeping the engines grinding — scrape by on £1,400 to £2,800 ($1,780 to $3,560) a year, according to job listings and worker reviews. That’s barely enough for a knackered phone and a bus pass. In Mexico, workers pull in about £2,000 ($2,540) annually, per posts on Indeed. Pocket change for Rumsey, who might blow that on a single speech, droning on about “purpose” to a room of clapping suits.
Here in the UK, Darlington’s factory crew — men and women sweating it out on the factory floor — earn around £29,000 ($36,800) basic a year, based on Glassdoor reviews. Decent, until you clock Rumsey’s pay: 517 times more. Compare that to the Indian crew, whose yearly take wouldn’t cover a curry night at The Ivy, and the gap’s a bloody chasm.
Then there’s Rumsey strutting onto stages in 2023, preaching about “strides in equal pay” and “inclusive opportunity” like she’s some champion of the downtrodden. Equal pay? Pull the other one. She’s waving the flag for women’s wages, banging on about closing the gender gap, while she’s raking in more before lunch than most men and women in her own company earn in a year. Those Indian operators, half of them likely blokes, are toiling for £2,800 ($3,560) tops. The Mexican workers, men included, are lucky to see £2,000 ($2,540). Even in Darlington, where the lads on the line make £29,000 ($36,800) basic, Rumsey’s earning enough in a morning to make their annual pay look like loose change. She’s out there, all earnest, telling women to “lean in” while the men under her command — never mind the women — can’t even afford to lean on a pint. Hypocrisy doesn’t just drip from her words. It pours like a busted tap.
This isn’t just a CEO doing CEO things. It’s a bloody performance. Rumsey’s got the nerve to stand at podiums, microphone in hand, selling “values” and “equity” to rooms full of nodding suits while her own house is built on a foundation of wage gaps you could drive a lorry through. Championing equal pay for women? Sure, if you’re in the C-suite. For the rest, man or woman, it’s a different story. The Indian bloke welding parts, the Mexican fella assembling engines, the Darlington lad on the night shift — they’re not seeing her “strides.” They’re seeing payslips that sting like a slap while she’s counting millions in her corner office. That’s not leadership. It’s a con dressed up in corporate jargon and a power suit.
Cummins calls it “powering a prosperous world.” Prosperous for who? The grunts in India and Mexico, the Darlington crew — men and women alike — they’re the ones powering it, busting their guts for a sliver of the pie. The prosperity? That’s stacking up in Rumsey’s bank vault while she spins yarns about fairness to anyone who’ll clap.
Next time she bangs on about gender equity or opportunity, picture this: a Pune factory worker, could be a man, staring at a payslip that wouldn’t buy a pint while she counts her millions. Or a Darlington bloke clocking off after an eight-hour shift, knowing she’s earned his year’s wage in a day. That’s Cummins’ “vision.” Tastes like betrayal, and it’s a bitter bloody brew.
Lee Thompson
Founder, The Cummins Accountability Project
Disclaimer
The figures in this piece — CEO pay, worker wages, the lot — are scraped from public sources like corporate filings, salary websites and employee reviews. They’re as close to the mark as we can get without raiding Cummins’ HR files, but they’re a patchwork, subject to exchange rates, reporting gaps and corporate smoke and mirrors. Believe them or not, that’s your shout.
Sources
ChatGPT
Indeed: Mexico Worker Salaries
Salary.com: J.W. Rumsey Compensation at Cummins Inc.
Simply Wall St: Cummins Inc. Management Analysis
Erieri: Jennifer Rumsey Salary Information
Glassdoor: UK Factory Worker Salaries