Holiday Bonus

My old paper was family-owned. He, at times, was a grinch, but gave out bonuses every year. Mine gradually increased to about $200 before I left.

I've been at my current job about three months. It and several other area papers were started by a geezer who sold out to a newspaper company last December. The new company at this year's Christmas party gave bonuses based on time served with the company (including before they bought it out). My check was $23.09 after taxes so I'm guessing it would have been $100 had I been here a year. I expected nothing.
Everyone else who had been with the company for years was ecstatic. Turns out the old man who used to own it gave everyone two pounds of bacon. Seriously.

 

$500 (but it was on paycheck so after taxes about $375-ish) and the publisher picked up the food and booze tab for everyone today at lunch/party. and we're getting monday and tuesday off for xmas and for new year's.

 

Nothing here (although is nice weather a Christmas bonus for some? ;D). I found that smaller shops were more inclined to do that than the bigger ones.

 

A donation has been made in your name to the Human Fund! ;D

 

25 years in the biz, and still waiting for my first Christmas bonus.

 

Nothing. My favorite was at the largest paper I worked for, a gift certificate for a frozen turkey, and a note saying you could donate your frozen turkey if you didn't want it. That's what we did. I cook a turkey about once a month, but we buy fresh ones because they are less of a hassle. Last year a supermarket gave us a free frozen turkey and we drove it to the food bank.

 

In the immortal words of A Tribe Called Quest:

Nada, nada, nada. Not a damn thing.

I'm not stressing though. It's a smaller operation than where I used to work. Now, where I used to work went from a decent Christmas bonus to $50 mall gift certificates this year. My old boss got the two best one-liners.

"Don't spend it all in one place. Oh, wait, I guess you kind of have to spend it all in one place."

and ...

"So, was this a 'buy 300 and get 50 free' deal or what?"

 

Got one but it's shrinking yearly. We'll probably be in Jelly of the Month territory by 2009.

 

$20 gift card, up from 10 last year because the company thought its employees could use the extra "help" after a recent ice storm. The genoricty underwhelmed me. It bought a couple of frozen pizzas for some buddies and me to watch Tuesday's Mizzou-Illini game, and a six-pack of Leiny's Sunset Wheat.

 

$50 gift card to a local grocery store chain/major advertiser. Hey, that's groceries for a week, can't complain. More would be nice but we've got to keep wiring our 30 percent cut to the mother ship.

 

Potluck in the newsroom and no $$$.

At least I've still got a job.

 

$500, but after taxes it was somehow reduced to $308. I'm grateful, but scratching my head over the taxes. Uncle Sam seemed to be a little more greedy this year than in years past.