Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
Wiktionary
n. (context idiomatic English) Any arrangement or agreement designed to provide extremely favorable benefits or pay, so as to discourage a participant from wanting to leave it, especially to retain a choice employee.
Wikipedia
Golden handcuffs, a phrase first recorded in 1976, refers to financial allurements and benefits that have the objective to encourage highly compensated employees to remain within a company or organization instead of moving from company to company (or organization to organization) (opposite of a golden parachute). Golden handcuffs come in different forms: Employee stock options, which endow only when the employee has been with the company or organization for different years and contractual agreements, that consist of bonuses or other forms of benefits which must be repaid to the company if the employee leaves before the date agreed on. Golden handcuffs are frequently used for jobs that require rare and specialised skills or in a "tight labor market", where jobs are more common than workers. In any case, golden handcuffs are usually very expensive for the company or organization and therefore they are not appreciated by shareholders and directors.
Usage examples of "golden handcuffs".
Came then, from the back of the room a procession headed by the high dignitary whose office it was to make these two man and wife, and directly behind him a richly-clad youth bearing a silken pillow on which lay the golden handcuffs connected by a short length of chain-of-gold with which the ceremony would be concluded when the dignitary clasped a handcuff about the wrist of each symbolizing their indissoluble union in the holy bonds of wedlock.
The dignitary lifted the golden handcuffs from the pillow upon which they reposed.
The mortgage, the twins, the car payments: All these turned his paycheck into golden handcuffs.