Why the Annual Value Does Not Match When Multiplying an Hourly Rate by 2080

Only company administrators can access the Budget Builder tool in BalancedComp.

You may notice that multiplying an hourly rate by 2,080 hours does not always return the expected annual salary. This behavior is expected and is the result of how compensation data is sourced and calculated within the system.

Compensation data is always established using annual salary values, not hourly rates. Hourly rates are derived from these annual amounts for display purposes only.

How Values Are Calculated

Salary survey data provides compensation figures as annual values
Midpoints and ranges are calculated using these annual figures
The hourly rate is calculated by dividing the annual value by 2,080 hours
The resulting hourly rate is rounded to two decimal places

Why the Values Do Not Match

Hourly rates being rounded to two decimal places introduces a small variance.

Example

Annual salary: $52,000
Hourly rate calculation: $52,000 ÷ 2,080 = $25.00

In some cases, the division results in a value with more than two decimal places:

Annual salary: $50,000
Hourly rate calculation: $50,000 ÷ 2,080 = $24.03846... → rounded to $24.04

When reversed:

$24.04 × 2,080 = $50,003.20

This difference is caused entirely by rounding.

Important Notes

Annual salary is the source of truth
Hourly rates are derived and rounded for display
Reverse calculations from hourly to annual will not always be exact