Where’s my Wall Street bonus?

By Dian Vujovich

Every now and then, usually around bonus season, I wish I had stayed in the brokerage business. It was great fun —and challenging—selling securities. The reason I left the sales part of the financial industry was two-fold: First, I didn’t care for the fact that management valued your worth based pretty much only on how much money you made each and every month. It’s that old, “You’re only as good as your last sale” mentality. And, it was a turn off for me.

The second: I’m not 100 percent money driven. In my world, there is more value to a person’s life than the amount of money they earn.

Of course, neither of those reasons can keep the pangs of envy I feel away whenever I learn just how much the purveyors of money receive in bonus pay each year.

Last year, 2013, for instance, the average Wall Street bonus was up 15 percent from the year before (2012), was the most since 2008 and the third highest on record. Oh my.

So how much was the average bonus? Well,  $164,530.  Remember, that’s an average as many received far more and far less.

Putting that into some kind of local perspective, that’s more than three times the average annual salary of a person living in Palm Beach County. It’s around $52,800.

Given that the size of a bonus is doled out by one’s employer and their desire to reward their employees by paying a bonus, the amount each worker-bee receives is typically calculated and based upon that person’s annual salary.

So while someone on Wall Street or Main Street earning 50-some thousand dollars a year might get a three-or four-digit sized bonus,who can complain. Any b is better than none from where I sit—even though bonuses are subject to taxation.

Back to me and my non-bonus, (freelancers don’t get bonuses). I’m beginning to think that since my beat is Wall Street, there ought to be someone I can call to ask for a tiny piece of that bonus pie. Let me know if you know that person’s number.