A resistive composition that can form a thick film resistor excluding a toxic lead component from a conductive component and glass and having characteristics equivalent to or superior to conventional resistors in terms of, in a wide resistance range, resistance values, TCR characteristics, current noise characteristics, withstand voltage characteristics and the like. The resistive composition of the present invention includes: ruthenium-based conductive particles including ruthenium dioxide; a glass frit that is essentially free of a lead component; and an organic vehicle, wherein the glass frit is a glass frit which is constituted such that in a case where a fired product of a mixture of the glass frit and the ruthenium dioxide has in a range of 1 kΩ/□ to 1 MΩ/□, the fired product exhibits a temperature coefficient of resistance in a plus range.