Comments on: "Betrayed" AIG Exec Offers Public Resignation

[buzongtang]

It says in the article he was working on a $1 annual salary. For those of you who cannot read, that comes to a wopping sum of $1 dollar every year. Granted, this man probably has some investments with hearty dividends, among other assets. However, he probably has a lot of liabilities too. Either way, who wants to work for $1 a year? So, for all you gripers about how he is just being a whiny corporate pig, think about it like that. And then, why would you not quit a situation where both the government and your corporate superiors were shoveling blame on you while, at the same time, refusing to pay you even minimum wage for working 12-14 hour days?

Like I said, he probably has bills to pay too. And his dignity to worry about. I would lose patience if I were in his situation too. This man is within the bounds of sanity for quitting.

Furthermore, whether some people like to admit it or not, AIG is important to our economic survival. If the people who keep it running start jumping ship left and right, do you think that is going to do us good? If you give them a relatively paltry bonus and they stay on the job, how does that translate into a bad thing?

If you think a few million dollars in corporate bonuses is a waste of tax payer money, then you are not looking in the right places. The Federal government is the most efficient expert at wasting tax payer money and barely anyone bothers to complain year after year.

[citizen4honor]

I can't the ignorance of people that are asking what failed mortgages have to do with AIG? How many Americans are this stupid?

Let's see if you can follow this.

A bunch of people (Mr. & Mrs. Unqualified) took out mortgages they could not afford - mostly on variable rate mortgages. The Rate went up - and the payment went up - now they can not pay.
A bunch of these homes were taken over by the bank that lent them the money.

Now the banks have all these homes with no income coming in from them. So the banks started losing money.

AIG was into mortgage trading and took some very risky moves. 11 to 1 odds trading. As the mortgages failed so did the trades.

Also when the banks lose money, they go to their insurance company AIG.

So Mr. & Mrs. Unqualified that took out loans for mortgages they couldn't pay, caused the the banks to fail and AIG went down too.

Now in the idiots defence we have ACORN and congress who helped pushed people into buying homes they couldn't afford and forcing banks to lend Mr. & Mrs. Unqualified money so they are responsible too.

AIG gave money to Goldman Sacs, CIti Banks, State of California who also got bailout money from the Federal Gov't. There's some double dippin going on here too.

By the way, there was a person earlier who said they made $20,000/year and didn't want their tax dollars going to AIG, well it won't coz you don't make enough money to be paying any income taxes, only those making over $70,000/year should have a say in these, the rest of you aren't contributing to the bailout.

[cs4466]

If you want socailism then follow Obama.

If you don't know who DIck Morris is, maybe you should look him up.
Posted by citizen4honor at 12:10 PM : Mar 25, 2009

If you don't know what socialism is, maybe you should look it up.

[Kaiwa747]

Your president wear 3 top hats. Can any of you understand what is the 3 top hats is?

[EatCake]

You sell a product, those who buy it pay you for it, you in turn pay yourself and your operating expenses from what they pay you.

You sell a product, people have paid you for that product, but you are having trouble delivering that product to them. What do you do? Ignore the people that have paid you money and pay yourself your regular salary and maintain your same operating expenses?

The money you pay yourself with and that goes toward expenses comes from where, you? No, it comes from the customer who paid you money in exchange for a product you must deliver on or be held liable for the amount they paid you. How do you pay that liability or deliver what your customers paid for? By paying a bonus to yourself? By adding to your operating expense by paying bonuses to others?

Why does anyone believe AIG and a number of other huge corporations are in bad shape? Their executives are worried more about their pay and bonuses than sustaining the business that pays those salaries and bonuses. To sustain that business you need to make good on delivering what people paid you for before you pay yourself, since the money they paid you is not yours until you have delivered on your part of the bargain.

[Kaiwa747]

Who own the federal reserve people? One things you don't own it. they control your government.
US taxpayers reserve? you own it. Now if you invest into your own country guess what. Who will control the government? HMMMMMMM go figure and educate yourself. Your president is reaching out to you people so WAKE UP!!!!!!

[omega39-2009]

Wall street did not create this mess, Congress did. Our gov't did. People who took out loans they could not pay did.
Posted by citizen4honor at 12:10 PM :

Can you please explain what failed mortgages have to do with American Insurance Group?
Posted by dragonwagon5

A bunch of former AIG employees now have one.

[cheetah-man7]

Despite the fact that I can certainly understand his anger at feeling betrayed, I can only limit my sympathy to that alone. The fact that this Bozo was pulling home 3/4 of a million a year does not tear at my heartstrings. He should just shut up and move on to a new job. This sort of news serves to only stir the pot of anger already felt by this nation!

[dwath]

Nothing in life is simple. This case is the same. What I earn a year is immaterial to what anyone else earns a year. It has to do w/ my skills and knowledge and responsibility. Likewise, is this gentleman worth 750k a year? I do not know. I neither curse nor bless; however, there are some general statements regarding the situation.
1. Clearly Congress and the administration have bungled things bandly. (Goes back to Bush admin Tarp as well.)
2. The companies are in large part to blame for where they are today. But, Congress, the Exexutive and probably legislative all have their parts to blame.
3. Let's not forget our individual greed which certainly has played a part in what goes on.
4. The screaming, especially from the Congress, is highly hypocritical. To every Senator or Congressman who voted for these bills w/o reading them, shut up! You KNOW you did not know what was in there, You did not care what was in there and you voted for it! Do not cry now.
5. Let's not forget the part of the media. Are these bonuses evil? Who knows? There has been zero reporting on who got them (positionally), how much they were individually, how deserved they were and what was the total package. An executive level salary of 750k per year is not a lot of money. If you only get paid by bonus, it is really not a bonus. 185 million in bonuses is a huge number, but, is it a lot or excess of money for the compensation of the work that was done? Again, who knows? CBS, FOX, ABC, and the great lefty NBC have all been very silent on exactly what was covered. They have not even asked the questions. They created the hysteria, but, do we know if the hysteria is warranted? Would we be mad if they said we have 500 000 employees and spent 200 million paying them (40k a year?) Again, bias in the news and manipulation of the news has much less to do with what is reported than with what is not reported.

Personally, I think most of these companies should be left along to sink or swim. We are going through a big reset and sometimes that is what is necessary.

[omega39-2009]

I fear you are right on. I have heard Dick Morris' explanation and it fits too well with what we observe. Obama wants the baks to fail so his administration can take them over. Then, through the banks, he can manipulate whatever he wants. The Europeans see this (they have seen it before) and are beginning to talk that the Dollar should be replaced as the world currency standard.
Posted by McHineguy

I'm not sure where you've been over the last four years, but talk of America losing its reserve currency status has been bandied about since the United States reached the twin milestone of record debt and record trade deficits resulting in a diminishing dollar.