Wall Street Bonus Update
February 24, 2010 – 12:44 pmI attended the February 23rd press conference held by New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli where he announced that Wall Street bonuses tallied at least $20.3 billion in 2009 and industry profits could exceed $55 billion for the year – nearly three times the previous record. While a blogger or two from a major political website is occasionally included in such events, this may have been the first time a blogger for an investing/economics site was on the press invitation list.
The Wall Street bonuses revealed by the comptroller were literally that – compensation paid to employees working in New York City.
With the recent natural disasters and also economic recession, many people are being extra careful to make sure their donations go as far as possible. Earlier this month, BusinessWeek ran an article Philanthropy: Rethinking How to Give which did a good job exploring the many websites now available to help you do just that. Initially, most websites focused on financial factors like what percentage of donations go to administrative or fundraising expenses, whereas now many sites tackle the harder task of measuring actual impact for the dollar.