There are two major issues that Darryl Boulton misses completely in his article Bankers and Bonuses (The Actuary, March). First, it is wrong, but a sad part of our culture, that various, but quite small groups, of our society get ridiculously large remuneration (which they then show off). At the same time there are so many others, indeed the majority, who are doing equally valuable jobs but paid low wages.
By valuable, I speak of their contribution to society. Boulton ignores this very critical point.
Second, he claims that most jobs are suited to quantitative assessment. That may be the case with many jobs in the City of London, but it is certainly often not the case outside. I have spent a lot of time at hospices where staff and nurses seek to give dying patients as comfortable a death as possible. They gain satisfaction from seeing the reactions from patients and carers. But it is not possible to measure a good death objectively. There are lots of other jobs to which, in my view, this applies - probably the majority of jobs.
Boulton also talked about his team of 12 graduates and said everyone was a winner. Clearly, that was not the case because they had quite different productivity and got different pay. Maybe with better and more empathetic management, there might have been more equality, more satisfaction and better productivity.
My overall concern on this subject relates to the size of this remuneration inequality, which is driving increasing divisions in our society and leading to unsettlement and strife between those who have and those who don't.
Hugh Scurfield 7 March
