Investment Salary

Investment is a risky proposition in any market, but especially today when the market is low and volatile, it is never an entirely safe bet. A salary on the other hand is what you earn from working in a solid career which guarantees to pay you for the hours you work as long as it is within your contract. Therefore, there is really no such thing as an investment salary. Investments can pay off big for you, but they won't pay you on salary unless you want them to, as you are personally in control of all your investments, or else indirectly in control of them while operating through a broker as an intermediary. Still, the point remains, there is really no such thing as an investment salary.

However, there is such a thing as an investment banker. Investment banker salary is traditionally very large, sometime starting at over seventy thousand dollars ($70,000) per year with the opportunity for even more money to come in through bonuses if good calls are made and money is made for your firm. Investment bankers have come under fire lately as many of them, along with other members of the Wall Street elite have been subject to a whole heaping helping of populist anger after the financial meltdown, subsequent bank bailouts, and then the return of the banks to the same practices which got them into trouble in the first place. It is hard to say if such investment banker salaries will continue in the future as public opinion and political environment is shifting towards breaking up the largest banks and placing taxes and restrictions on the high risk maneuvering which made such exorbitant amounts of money for investment salary possible. Investment bankers may soon see a time when they are living in slightly smaller castles, but that is not for certain, and even if it were, those who deal with money will always know how to manipulate the system to get themselves more of it. As they say, that is the nature of the beast.

Common Myths about Investment Salary:
(keep in mind, this website does not claim to offer expert financial advice, and none of the information therein should be considered as such)

• The stock market is a great way to get rich quick
  
  • Maybe, but probably not. Yes, the stock market is a large market of money in which there are constant and sometimes dramatic shifts that can make people money, but there's a catch. First of all, in almost all cases, to make big money, you have to spend big money, and any time you spend big money, you run the risk of losing big money. Also, if you are making more sensible investments, it often makes much more sense to leave your money in the market for a long period of time. The movies you see about buying and selling stocks as people scream at each other on the floor of the New York stock exchange will most likely not be anything like your experience, and the safest and most likely investments to make you money are long term investments in mutual funds.
    
    
• Investors are financial geniuses
  
  • If there's anything this recent crisis has taught us, it's that investors, and the people in charge of investment banks are often there not because they're the smartest or the most qualified, but instead because they were the most ambitious, the most willing to take risks, the most money hungry, and sometimes, even that they were the luckiest. Often times, being pretty good at math is the only real cognitive gift these people have, so it's not always the best choice to trust them with all of your money just because they have a flashy suit and a nice car. They care more about getting more money to spend than they really care about your personal finances or needs. It's a cruel truth, but these people have been receiving undue reverence since the eighties and it is finally coming around as people realize in many cases, the risks these people take with investors money is almost criminal if not in fact criminal.
    
    
• It is a bad idea to invest right now
  
  • This isn't necessarily true. Consider that old adage, "buy low, sell high." Now is definitely a time when stock values are low. Perhaps a re-investment by a large number of consumers is exactly what it will take to start bringing about jobs in the country again. If this happens, maybe jobs will be created that can actually pay, in effect, investment salary, which would finally make their exist such a concept as investment salary.