Bonuses for Wall Street workers fell about 2% in 2023 from the year before, with the average bonus coming in at around $176,500, according to the annual estimate from the Office of the New York State Comptroller released Tuesday.

A total of about $33.8 billion in bonuses was paid out in 2023, a basically unchanged pool from 2022, meaning bonuses were a bit lower last year because of a slight bump in the number of people working in the industry, New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli found.

Wall Street profits increased 1.8% in 2023, the comptroller's office said, but its firms have taken a more cautious approach to compensation, which partly accounts for the slight decline in the average bonus.

“Wall Street’s average cash bonuses dipped slightly from last year, with continued market volatility and more people joining the securities workforce,” DiNapoli said. “While these bonuses affect income tax revenues for the state and city, both budgeted for larger declines so the impact on projected revenues should be limited. The securities industry’s continued strength should not overshadow the broader economic picture in New York, where we need all sectors to enjoy full recovery from the pandemic.”

The bonuses, and Wall Street's larger economic performance, have a significant impact on the tax revenue of New York City as well as the state. The securities industry accounted for roughly $5.4 billion, or about 7%, of total city tax revenue and about $28.8 billion, or approximately 27.4%, of state tax revenue for the 2023 fiscal year, DiNapoli estimated. An estimated 198,500 people worked in the securities industry in 2023, up from about 191,600 the year prior, with DiNapoli's office estimating about one in 11 jobs in New York City has a direct or indirect relationship with Wall Street. Despite the added jobs last year, employment in New York's financial sector remains about 1.3% below record levels set in 2000.

As debates over remote work and return-to office-mandates continue, Wall Street has a comparatively high rate of in-office work, with 65% of employees in office on a given day in September 2023, compared with the 58% at all firms in the city, according to a Partnership for New York City survey.

The slight drop in average bonuses capped what was a positive year for Wall Street overall, with a number of tech stocks reaching all-time highs amid sky-high demand for artificial intelligence (AI) products and the Dow Jones Industrial Average, S&P 500, and Nasdaq Composite all rising between 14% and more than 43% in 2023.