I knew a guy who came up with a project that brought in a million dollars for his employer – according to him, anyway – and when he got his next performance review, his supervisor marked the “meets all job requirements” box.

“Sheesh,” the guy said to me, “what do I have to do to get ‘exceeds job requirements’?”

Well, maybe he could work for the state.

I don’t know what their performance reviews look like, but a fair number of state employees apparently become eligible for a bonus just by showing up for work.

The good news is: It looks like we have such a great group of people running our government that we can’t afford to lose them. They all took these jobs because they wanted to make Iowa better. Every one of them could be getting rich in the private sector. Right this second. All they have to do is pick up the phone.

The bad news: Are we sure about that?

Here’s a mental challenge for you: Read through the list of bonuses that intrigued the Legislature’s Government Oversight Committee last week and try not to think about the income tax check you sent to the state this past spring. Careful; don’t hurt yourself.

Jeff Vonk makes $108,000 as director of the Department of Natural Resources. Maybe that doesn’t sound like anything special to the readers of the Business Record, but it’s not bad. And yet we throw in an extra $188.18 every pay period to keep him on the job. We must have figured $150 wouldn’t be enough to keep him from applying for really good park ranger jobs, and $200 would be overkill.

Gary Maynard is slightly ahead of Vonk; he makes $126,000 as director of the Department of Corrections. (Admit it; you’d rather work with natural resources than with people who need correcting.) We give him a retention bonus of $467.05 every pay period so he doesn’t go off to a better corrections place with more stylish orange jumpsuits.

Mike Blouin is a big man around here, and he’s in a vaguely defined line of work that probably does translate into job offers. But a $59,000 bonus on top of a $130,000 salary seems like the kind of generosity that made Santa Claus famous.

The regular-installment bonuses are the curious ones, leading you to wonder why these folks didn’t just get a raise. Somebody’s trying to fool somebody.

A bonus for an example of outstanding effort, that’s more understandable. That sounds like … a bonus. But payoffs just to keep people from walking – I thought you had to work for your dad to get that kind of treatment.

As disheartening as it is to see the gargantuan pay raises the state forks over to football and basketball coaches, at least you see the results. Take the team to a big-money bowl game and the school gets a bucket of cash. Maybe the coach does deserve to reach in and scoop some out.

In the grand scheme of things, yes, the pharmacists at the Commission of Veterans Affairs probably are doing more important work than a football coach. But they willingly signed up for jobs that pay more than $60,000 (note: this still isn’t bad), and now they’re getting another $500 or $600 per paycheck. If that should end, and they decide to go searching for their very own bowl-game payout, all we can say is enjoy the free market and thanks for playing.

By the way, we found one pharmacist who was receiving payola right up until he stopped being on the payroll. Looks like nobody explained to him how a retention bonus is supposed to work.