Total Compensation Builder — Base + Bonus + Equity + Benefits

Not every offer component is worth the same

An offer quoting $200k sounds impressive until you break it apart: $120k base, $20k target bonus paid only if goals are hit, $50k of annualised equity that requires you to stay to collect, and $10k of employer retirement match that only reaches you if you contribute enough to earn it.

The single figure treats all four as equivalent, and they are not remotely. That is the whole problem with a total-compensation number — and also why base salary alone is the wrong comparison, since it genuinely understates what a job is worth. Both errors are real; the fix is to look at the components.

Certain, conditional, and hopeful

• Base salary — certain. You are owed it by contract and it arrives whatever happens.
• Employer retirement match and health contribution — real money, but conditional. The match requires you to contribute enough to trigger it and, often, to stay through a vesting schedule. The health contribution is worth its face value only if you would otherwise have bought comparable cover, and it cannot pay rent either way.
• Target bonus — a forecast, not a payment. The question worth asking before accepting is what percentage of target was actually paid in each of the last two or three years. A company that has paid 40% of target twice running has just told you what the number is worth.
• Equity — the most over-weighted line by a wide margin. Public-company stock has a genuine market price, though it fluctuates and arrives only as it vests. Private-company equity is valued at the share price set by the company's own last funding round, which is a hopeful number rather than a market one, and it can end up worth nothing.

Vesting is a tenure requirement, not extra cash

This is where the arithmetic misleads most. A $240,000 grant vesting over four years is quoted as $60,000 a year — a figure that quietly assumes four years of tenure, which is longer than many people stay in a role.

Two mechanics to keep straight. A cliff, usually at one year, means leaving before it vests nothing at all — the entire first tranche is forfeited rather than pro-rated. After the cliff, you keep what has vested and forfeit the rest, so departing at three years of a four-year grant means walking away from roughly $60,000 of the stated package.

The tool annualises the grant across the vesting period so you can put it on the same scale as salary. Use the steady-state figure rather than year one, because year one includes any sign-on bonus and a one-off payment flatters a weak base exactly once.

Compare guaranteed cash first

The discipline that makes this tractable is ranking components by how assured they are: base salary, then match and benefits if you will claim them, then bonus if the company actually pays it, then equity if you stay and the company succeeds.

Compare offers on the guaranteed portions first and treat the rest as upside. A large equity figure should not dominate a decision if you are unsure the company survives, or if you have no intention of staying four years — in either case that part of the number is not yours.

One thing that should never appear in a figure describing what you receive: employer-side payroll taxes and mandatory contributions. They are a genuine cost to the employer and no value to you, and including them inflates the total without benefiting anyone.

This is general information, not financial, tax or career advice. Tax treatment of bonuses and equity instruments varies considerably by jurisdiction and by personal circumstance, so anyone weighing a significant equity component should get advice specific to their own situation.

Once the full package is on paper, the natural next question is what a change to it costs. The salary raise calculator answers that for the base figure.