Goldman's Nine-Month Pay Cost Declines to $292,836 Per Employee

[highplainsdem]

Source: Bloomberg

Oct. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Goldman Sachs Group Inc. set aside $10 billion to pay employees in this year's first nine months, down 24 percent from the same period last year as revenue slid and the firm cut jobs.

The compensation expense, which includes salaries, bonuses, stock awards and benefits, was equivalent to $292,836 for each of the company's 34,200 workers as of Sept. 30. A year earlier Goldman Sachs employed 35,400 people, who shared about $13.1 billion, or $370,706 each, for the nine-month period.

Goldman Sachs is among firms that have been targeted by lower Manhattan protests, called Occupy Wall Street, that seek to call attention to the income disparity between the wealthiest 1 percent of the population and everyone else. Related demonstrations took place on four continents over the weekend. Sixty-seven percent of New York City voters support the movement, according to a Quinnipiac University survey yesterday.

Goldman Sachs, which set a Wall Street pay record for a securities firm before converting to a bank in response to the financial crisis, may cut compensation for the second year in a row as declining markets sap trading revenue. After setting aside 39 percent of revenue for compensation in 2010, the company has allocated 44 percent of revenue for pay and benefits so far this year. Revenue for this year's first nine months fell 25 percent $22.8 billion.

-snip-


Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2011/10/18/bloomberg_articlesLT9GDZ07SXKX.DTL

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This is still an obscenely high average compensation.

And note that with revenues slipping, they're just allocating a larger share of that revenue for pay and benefits, most of which of course will go to top management.

[wordpix]

1. awwww, those poor workers taking such a big pay cut

:nopity: :sarcasm:

[Enrique]

2. how did Bloomberg put it?

he said they were "scraping by", or something?

[CanonRay]

3. They probably did it by cutting the janitors pay

and leaving the execs alone. But then I'm a cynic.

[Overseas]

4. K&R.

[wordpix]

5. and that's just for 9 mos.---annually it's $390,448

[UpInArms]

15. thanks for that post - I was working on the math of it also

:grrr:

[OhioChick]

6. Poor things

:nopity:

[They_Live]

7. Deceptively written "sympathy" piece

averaging the total for all employees. As if to say, "see, they don't make that much money".
How much of that amount is going to the CEO, etc.?

[supernova]

8. How much for Admin Assists. and Mail Clerks?

I bet no where near that.

[madrchsod]

12. i have a friend who worked at boa`s mailroom

just above a minimum living wage for new york city.

[valerief]

9. I hardly think most of the workers are getting that. Megamillions go to their top 1%, too.

Most employees are part of the 99%, I'm sure.

[dipsydoodle]

13. My thoughts too

It also however a fact of life , sad as it may be , that in the absense of the 1% the other 99% wouldn't necessarily be there in total.

[Initech]

10. It's official: we live in the Matrix.

We're supposed to feel sorry? I'm not! :nopity:

[sarcasmo]

19. So true, which pill do you choose, that is the question.

[HughBeaumont]

11. THE IGNOMY!! THE INJUSTICE!!! THE OUTRAGE!!!!

[bullwinkle428]

14. Time for DU to take up a collection!

[redixdoragon]

16. It's likely these numbers represent the mean average

Not the median average.

It's like taking a bar where you've got a bunch of say grocery clerks, making at best 20k a year. Bill gates walks in and suddenly the average income of all the patrons of the bar is $1,000,000 a year.

If pay is going down it's likely the compensations are dropping for those at the bottom to middleish areas. The top fights tooth and nail to grow their income. It's a pathological obsession.

[midnight]

17. These folks should try to live off of a nurse's pay-after Scott Walker

ramps up his nickle and dime operation... Pay more of your own insurance-check; Pay more of your retirement-check; rating your earned sick hours to be worth less-check; mandatory time off-check; losing earned vacation hours if not used up-check. By the time Scotty has nicked and dimed those first responders... they have monies for food and shelter and not much else..... Plus no bonuses and other luxuries these candy asses expect.....

[sarcasmo]

18. The IRS describes the top 1% as making 350,000 or more a year.

Sachs is one of the parasites that must be destroyed to make this country whole again.