Buy lottery tickets with the salary cost and go to the beach, seems about as effective and much more enjoyable.

Point about "what is a peer?" is well taken. Part of that is recognising when a topic is out of a reviewer's area of expertise, to not take on but refer such work (normal practice in other professions). Editors not reviewers are gatekeepers though: reviewers merely advise.

Then what's our job? I've thought long and hard about that question.

This would be clever if it weren't accidental.

That's literally your job. To think long and hard about things that matter, as a human being.

That's why you have tie continued payment to job quality (same as other professions). There would be nothing wrong with people earning their entire income from reviewing, as long as they were delivering for authors and editors.

The tokens (aka customer retention) and so called rewards like certificates to be added to a CV are outright insulting. I refuse to accept any of those glass beads for the gold I have on offer. We should redirect the immense money publishing houses make for their shareholders to science.

Some journals already do coupons where you get a discount on your next publication. But maybe you don't want to publish with them, or they don't accept your manuscript. Then the coupon has no value. Money can be freely exchanged for goods & services of your choice. No need to complicate things.

$250 is infinitely more than nothing, and for most of the world is a lot - definitely worth doing a good job for.

We know! Maybe not being beholden to shareholders gives them the flexibility to experiment with things like this that have the potential to increase costs.

Our view is that reviewers who can afford it should reduce their fee for non-profits, and charge full whack for the corporates.