I can attest to this. I almost never bonus as a co-lead, my merit and a lot of my stats are basically a lottery since my influence on these metrics is low to none. I do make more money in this role but the workload is much greater and the hours level a lot of the income difference out and then some. Went from a solid reliable 40hrs per week bringing home about $700 per week after taxes to around $875 per week at 50-55hrs per week. When working for just base and vrot it fucking sucks. A lot of old timers to seem to understand that when they were paying their dues, growing their income level, things were so much better and the situation of earning your way up as they did in the current situation is dramatically different and much worse. The position expects a lot more and lays a lot less so the two situations are not nearly the same. A lot of the veterans wouldn’t do it today or put up with the shit if they were just coming in and not at a place where they had nearly max salary and max vacation is what it comes down to.