I recently left a job that paid lower salaries and tried to focus on total compensation through bonus + benefits. The thing is, salary is steady and something I can budget my family off of. We can make decisions such as mortgage's, car payments, savings goals, investment goals, etc off of a salary. I can't do the same with a bonus. In fact, 08/09 made a lot of employees realize that the bonus can't be relied on in any way.

Is it possible to make more through total compensation of lower salary + bonus than high salary + little to no bonus? Sure. But I'm happier with the salary, and my hunch is that many other employees would feel the same.