NEW YORK TIMES: …In June 2010, the Federal Reserve, six months into a compensation review of the country’s 28 largest financial companies, found that many of the bonus and incentive programs that economists say contributed to the financial crisis remain in place…
Institutional investors are alarmed by what they characterize as excessive rewards for bank employees. While banks are increasing salaries and bonuses for many employees, many have yet to restore dividends that were cut during the financial crisis.
Even now, after all those big bonus numbers, the pay-to-profit ratio for the financial industry might come as a surprise to many people. The five largest banks on Wall Street — Bank of America, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Morgan Stanley — earned a combined $147.4 billion before paying compensation and taxes last year. They plowed back a combined $31.2 billion into their companies and returned a total of $2.1 billion to shareholders in the form of dividends. They paid $114.1 billion to their employees. … (more)
