[swombat]

In the City, you get hired based on a "total comp" package that includes salary and a practically guaranteed bonus, that can be as much as your base salary or even more.

[re_todd]

Well that changes everything, maybe we should reboot this entire thread.

[Nursie]

That is a minority of programmers, even for London.

[bearmf]

"Practically guaranteed" nowadays means about 70% probability in finance :). There are almost no hard guarantees anymore.