No, “deferred compensation” is very much money that has been paid to you, but you don’t immediately have access to it because it is stored in an account with so

No, “deferred compensation” is very much money that has been paid to you, but you don’t immediately have access to it because it is stored in an account with some kind of restriction, like a 401k or IRA. This is done to avoid having to pay a huge amount of taxes in one year, so the payments can be spread out over multiple years. There is almost always an option to invest the money so you don’t miss out on gains while you’re waiting for each payout.