386,395 Reasons to Work for Goldman Sachs

In its earnings report this morning, Goldman Sachs (GS) disclosed that the firm has set aside $6.65 billion to cover compensation for its 29,400 employees. Adding that to last quarter's $4.71 billion, Goldman has now set aside $11.36 billion in compensation during the first half of 2009, which works out to $386,395 per worker. While the year is only six months old, Goldman has already set aside more in compensation this year ($11.36 billion) than it did in all of 2008 ($10.9 billion).

To put this figure into perspective, the amount of money Goldman has set aside for compensation this year exceeds the market cap of 324 companies in the S&P 500. It is also nearly one billion dollars more than the combined market capitalizations of the twelve smallest companies (CIT, MTW, NYT, EK, GCI, MBI, CIEN, AIV, CTX, CVG, KBH, MDP) in the S&P 500.

While some will no doubt criticize Goldman's compensation levels and say they come at the expense of shareholders, we would note that through 7/13, Goldman Sachs was the 14th best performing stock in the S&P 500 this year with a gain of 77.1%. Shareholders that bought the stock recently probably aren't too upset.

Comments

[herbert hoover:]

It's easy to make money when the taxpayers are picking up your losses. May they all burn in hell

Jul 14 03:15 PM

[Larrysyr:]

A piece of me (pretty much 100%) thinks the bonus pool should be split evenly among the 300 million of us who bailed them out last year.

Jul 14 03:52 PM

[Alexander G...:]

Sounds like a couple people are jealous of the Goldman paycheck...

Jul 15 10:45 AM

[Caveat M. Tor:]

Alex G: This is not a matter of jealousy, it's a matter of fairness. The first two posts aren't about Warren Buffett or Bill Gates. They're about a company which, with inside connections in the administration, received billions in bailout funds from the taxpayers when needed last year, and is now, just months later, giving each employee more than 20 times what the average, hard-working full-time employee in this country earns. Those other employee-taxpayers were forced to pay for the bailout.

Jul 15 11:08 AM