Bonuses accounted for 80% of total pay at Goldman Sachs in 2007, according to a candid submission to the UK Government, which reveals for the first time how the world's most prestigious bank rewarded its employees just prior to the financial crisis.

According to written evidence passed by Goldman Sachs to the Treasury Select Committee, the influential parliamentary group charged with investigating the collapse of the banking system, bonuses made up 80% of total pay in 2007, up from 60% a decade earlier in 1998 and 62% in 1988. This meant that in 2007, for every $1 paid in salary, an additional $4 was paid in bonuses.