Salary
Average Salary: $15,000,000
Expected Lifetime Earnings: $626,220,000
Let's see: oil is the most sought-after resource on the planet, has a global market value somewhere in the trillions of dollars, and has been at least one of the reasons behind several of the bigger wars in the past century. Just one company, Exxon-Mobil, is worth almost half a trillion dollars alone, vying with Apple for the number one spot of most valuable company in the entire world (source). To say there's money to be made may be the understatement of the year―right after, "That climate change thing is kind of scary, eh?"
Big Oil is arguably the biggest industry, dollar-for-dollar, on all of planet Earth. When it wants something, like a fracking license or a continental pipeline, it's pretty much unstoppable.
We're talking about the industry where you can spill a massive amount of product, kill thousands of sea creatures, get fined tens of billions-with-a-B dollars, and have to spend hundreds of millions more on clean-up for the environment and the company image―and still turn a nice profit.
And what's the point of profit if it doesn't go somewhere useful, like into your bank account? After all, you own the company; technically every cent (which, after taxes, is still more cash than some midsize countries have) belongs to you.
None of this should come as a shock. Forbes annual list of Richest Jerkfaces (or something like that) is filled with the owners of oil companies (source). Oil is an unfortunate necessity in modern society, and the people who own and control its entire journey, from the ground to the gas tank, are going to make obscene amounts of cash.