What kind of company takes
$170,000,000,000
(yes, that’s BILLION)
from the taxpayers, because their company is going to fail and cause financial armageddon if it does… and then gives its crooked leadership
$165,000,000
(yes that’s MILLION)
in bonuses and ‘retention payments’ for causing the mess?
I don’t care if it’s how financial professionals are compensated. When I do crappy work, I dont’ get compensated… In fact, I’d be at home collecting unemployment if I did as bad a job as they have.
In fact, sometimes (currently) even when I do GREAT work, I don’t get my bonus… because of the greater economy.
To make matters worse, we’re told that although the government now has an
80% ownership stake in AIG
there is nothing our representatives can do to get that money back.
BULL.
We should be (and I am) completely outraged.
Anyone else with me in filing a class action lawsuit on behalf of the American People against AIG, naming the federal treasury as an accomplice, over this highway robbery of our hard earned money?
Yeah, I saw this story on the news last night and just stood there and stared at the TV in complete shock. You get money to bail you out of whatever mess you got yourself in and then you give it away as a bonus. Smart…real smart.
I completely disagree. These bonuses were contracted over a year ago based on their performance. These 400 employees aren’t paid big salaries and they make their money completely on their bonuses. It’s not the same as the end of year bonus we typically get. Being outraged at this is like being outraged at a restaurant who took bailout money paying their waiter’s tips.
Business rule #1: When there ain’t no money, there ain’t no money.
No excuse for taking money that was supposed to simply keep your toxic assets from taking down the world financial system and paying it to your employees.
It’s not the fact that they got paid that bugs me, it’s the fact that they sold us one story and are executing something completely different. Just more of the greed and dishonesty that got us here in the first place.
Aren’t employees your most valuable resource? Paying 400 employees what they were *contracted* to receive a year ago doesn’t seem to bad. They are probably the ones keeping AIG afloat. Just because they bought bad assets like everyone else doesn’t mean the employees are worthless.
Also if AIG didn’t pay out their employees, the employees should be suing AIG for breaking contract. AIG wasn’t allowed to go bankrupt, so they still have to meet their contractual obligations.
Also, the government bailouts actually asked them to buy up other banks, rather than shore up toxic assets. Plus, no one put stipulations on them, so who are we to complain when they have no rules to break?
The real outrage here should be that $96 billion dollars went to Europe and did not stay here in the country:
http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-CreditCrisis/idUSN1548789520090316
Sorry, one more article that I think really explains why we should be outraged at AIG.
The Real AIG Outrage:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123725551430050865.html
Agreed. The list of foreign banks paid off with taxpayer money is upsetting to say the least.
Since the bonus money is “contractual”, the next question is “Did anyone at AIG break the law?” I mean really, do we get to believe that no one broke any laws? How could that be? They were making money out of thin air. What this all boils down to is that capitalism isn’t all it’s made out to be … there needs to be some regulation. That being said, who knows what the regulation should be and how do we stay ahead of the creative minds at companies like AIG?
So aside from the outrage we’ve been hearing from the news media, here is the true story from one of the people receiving the bonuses.
Dear A.I.G., I Quit!
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/25/opinion/25desantis.html?_r=2&ref=opinion