15 of 20 top AIG execs agree to return bonuses

Good move for the 15, albeit late. The other 20 should be heavily taxed.

Good move for the 15, albeit late. The other 20 should be heavily taxed

Do you mean the other 5?

This goes to show the hilarity of these big corporations. This shows how these large corporations have been patting themselves on the shoulders with big bonuses whether you do a good job or not.

I think in my 37 years with the federal government, USMC and civil service, I never received more than a total of $5000.00. I can't fathom how someone would be entitled to $Millions$ for a successful project, let alone for failing at their jobs.

Since we own 80% of some of these corp. we need to make adjustments to their compensation packages. They are our employees. < :-)

lets have the names of the other 5

The real crooks here are the politicians (both sides of the aisle) who took money from these corps and pushed so hard for deregulation...the same ilk who now smack down any interventionist measures the new administration come up with. I am disgusted by the AIG bonuses but in perspective their ill-gotten gains are insignificant to the misdeeds of so many in Washington over the last few decades.

From an investing standpoint AIG just lost a lot of credit by bending to the will of the public. Contractually they were guaranteed those bonuses and allowing themselves to be manipulated by public opinion was a colossal display of weakness that they really can't afford at this point if they ever want to be seen as a respectable, IE profitable, corp again.

If AIG really wanted to gain some credit back in the business world it would have kept the bonuses and stated, quite plainly, that any attempt to impose additional taxes would be a breach of contract. And if they took it to court they would have won. A man motivated by profit is easy to predict, by returning the bonuses they have confused a lot of investors, and confused investors are never good investors.

shanabelle Phil Graham is the architec of the deregulations. He's the one that was John McCain's financial adviser who called Americans whiners and criers. John McCain had to get rid of him quickly. Deregulation was the republicans baby. I have to admit that Bill Clinton signed the package, but it was contrived and designed by the republicans.

Then AIG and the other losers bilked $Billions from all of us with the new rules and this is what we have. Corporations that lie, steal and than pat their bank accounts with these ill gained money. < :-)

lets have the names of the other 5

For a lynching? Disgraceful.

AIG gets $185 - billion - in bailouts from tax payers. The bonuses are $165 million. It works out to 0.09%. It is a red herring.

Your country is selling you out people. It's time to wake up.

There was another $53Million in bonus given to AIG executives in November, 2008. Damn thieves. Go after this money also. < :-)

The red herring point is technically correct, but it ignores the fact that most people can't really get their heads around what AIG did. Not because they are stupid, but because what AIG Financial Products was doing was very complex and totally INSANE. But people can understand that it is pretty weird to be getting a bonus for destroying a company, and might get pretty angry when they realize the bonus is coming from their own money. So the backlash was predictable.

As for the "if they ever want to be seen as a respectable, IE profitable, corp again" post. Huh? AIG is a corpse, it is dead, it has ceased to be. While that is unfortunate for the other, legitimate parts of the company and the people who work there, that's the reality.

And Phil Gramm should have been sent to Guantanamo years ago. A financial terrorist.

AIG is a corpse, it is dead, it has ceased to be.

Correction, it's brain dead on on a respirator. You can't really call it alive but it's not quite dead. A very sad existance but it exists nontheless.

People have got to see through the smoke and mirrors.

Had AIG been allowed to fail there would be no bonus issue to start with, and no absurd outflows of funds to the likes of.. JP Morgan ($400m), Morgan Stanley ($1.2b), Wachovia ($1.5b), B of A ($5.2b), Merrill Lynch ($6.8b), Goldman Sachs ($12.9b). Never mind the roughly $35 billion AIG had handed out to non-American banks.

Yeah, follow the money.

The other five are phantoms.

I sure AIG would have lost even more money without those five. (rolls eyes)