Assertion Contradicted AI assessment confidence: 95% certainty 3/5 debate potential 2/5

Schurig: Seven Fortune 250 Executives Die Annually from Unexpected Heart Attacks

Darwin Schurig · 7 Fortune 250 CEOs Die Unexpectedly Every Year From This · Oct 17, 2023 · at 35:30

Executive recruiter Darwin Schurig cites academic research regarding the severe health toll and cardiovascular risks of C-suite executive roles.

0:00 / 0:14exact quote · 14.2s

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“Stanford School of Business did a did a study, and it's like seven Fortune, 500 or Fortune two 50 CEOs or C level executives die of unexpected heart attacks every single year.”

quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →

The claim, plainly

A Stanford Graduate School of Business study found that approximately seven Fortune 250 or Fortune 500 C-level executives die of unexpected heart attacks every year.

a quote alone can be ambiguous, so this restates it with the references and context of the conversation around it resolved. AI-written; the tape below the player is the source.

Assessment

The claim mischaracterizes the findings of the relevant 2012 Stanford Graduate School of Business study ('Sudden Death of a CEO: Are Companies Prepared When Lightning Strikes?' by David F. Larcker and Brian Tayan). The Stanford GSB research found that an average of approximately seven CEOs of publicly traded U.S. companies died each year from all causes combined, not from unexpected heart attacks alone. In the study's 22-year dataset of 161 CEO deaths, 39 were caused by heart attacks, representing an average of approximately 1.77 CEO heart attack deaths per year across all publicly traded firms, rather than seven per year among Fortune 250 or Fortune 500 C-level executives.

Stanford GSB research by David F. Larcker and Brian Tayan (2012) found an average of ~7 CEO deaths per year across all causes combined in publicly traded U.S. companies.
The 2012 study identified 39 heart attack deaths over a 22-year span (~1.77 per year), not 7 per year.
The study examined CEOs of publicly traded U.S. companies generally, not Fortune 250 or Fortune 500 C-level executives specifically.

Checked against

[1] stanford.edu [2] stanford.edu [3] slideshare.net [4] raconteur.net [5] ingrams.com [6] ingrams.com [7] ingrams.com

"Stanford" "heart attacks" executive OR CEO "Fortune 500" OR "Fortune 250" "Larcker" "Tayan" "Sudden Death of a CEO" pdf OR text "Stanford Graduate School of Business" "CEO" "heart attack" OR "die" OR "death" OR "seven" OR "7" "Sudden Death of a CEO: Are Companies Prepared When Lightning Strikes" "David F. Larcker" "Brian Tayan" "seven CEOs of publicly traded companies die each year"

assessed as of 2026-09-02

This assessment is an AI reading of a public statement, made against the cited references with the confidence shown. It can be wrong. The quote, the tape and the references are all on this page; if something is off, use report an error below. full disclaimer →

Mentioned

Fortune two 50 CEOs Stanford School of Business

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