[ by Melanie Gretchen ] The face of Goldman Sachs is rapidly changing, according to NYTimes Reporter Sue Craig. As regulation and decreased revenue continue to take their toll – on all personnel levels.  The partnership pool shrunk, the elite are few in the firm, and the firm cut almost 10% of the staff – a sizable number of both in terms of the whole and the elite partner group. Doing the Math. The average salary of partners is $950,000, but the buck doesn't stop there.  Rather, that number may be less than half of it, after bonuses, according to CNBC Managing Editor Tyler Mathisen.  Recently, Ms. Craig tracked recent departures, including 3 partners on Friday, and 50 other executives laid off in the past few weeks – and finds the trend is not limited to Goldman.

"These are firms across Wall Street, be it Goldman, Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan, that are all seeing less revenue coming in. It's been difficult markets and they're also facing just really difficult time with new regulation, and it's just all pushing on the revenue, and they've got to get people out the door and shrink the numbers." -- Ms. Craig, in an interview with CNBC.

Within Goldman, departures and cuts are wide-spread and progressing, infiltrating merchant banking and mezzanine finance.  "There's been some senior departures, a few in the executive office, including people like Ed Forth, who co-managed asset management, and then you've also seen...a lot more partners leave in the last year and also executives," Ms. Craig said. The Bottom Line. In the end, "what it does is it simply gets rid of higher earners, at same time as getting rid of the broader, but you've seen deeper cuts within the executive suite.  Ultimately:  "You can cut at the top and save a lot more." For further details, go to [CNBC, 6/18/12].