What’s Another Million?
The furor over the AIG bonuses reminds me of when things are bad, public sentiment swings so fast that if you are in the way, death can behold you.
Yes, $165 Million was passed out to some AIG employees. Yet the government knew about it well before and allowed the bonuses to be paid. While the public is peeved off about the bonuses, the real concern should be the government’s inability to account for taxpayer money given away and any accountability to the company(ies) when it does.
But that’s not the point of today’s blog.
The point is if YOU were one of the AIG employees that received the bonus. Now remember, the contracts were negotiated well over a year ago and well before the company got into trouble. Like most contracts, these most likely stated that if they hit certain numbers, they would receive a bonus. There most likely was no language that the company would be off the hook if the company sought government financing.
So if this YOU and you make your number, would you expect to get your bonus? Think hard before answering.
And before you answer, think about this. Tiger Woods gets paid endorsements for many products. The endorsements are valued when he is playing golf on national TV. Now he gets surgery and can’t play for a year. Should Tiger return a portion of his endorsements to the companies since the company still had to pay in full?
One final thought: The media loves to push our buttons. It sells more advertising. Perhaps someone should have thought of not giving AIG any government money in the first place and then this wouldn’t have happened. How about that?
Happy Thursday!
March 19th, 2009 at 12:36 pm
I think I would assume that if the company I worked for received money from the bail-out (key word, BAIL-OUT!), that I wouldn’t be getting a bonus at all – regardless of the contracts. But, that’s me – I’m sure that if they didn’t award the bonuses that the employees would be up in arms about it though. It would have still received media coverage either way and I’m sure someone somewhere would have been encouraging AIG’s employees to make a fuss about it.
Check this out, “In comments yesterday, President Obama appeared to take responsibility for allowing the bonuses to go through. “Listen, I’ll take responsibility. I’m the president,” he said at a town meeting in Costa Mesa, Calif. He noted that “we didn’t draft these contracts,” but said, “it’s my job to make sure we fix these messes, even if I don’t make ‘em.”
And what do you make of that?
March 19th, 2009 at 1:51 pm
AIG said the bonuses were to retain top talent in order to keep making $$
and subsequently keeping the economy rolling.
But… didn’t they need to borrow money – does that reflect their top tallent doing what they should to earns a bonus?
March 19th, 2009 at 2:49 pm
My biggest thing is that there are many people that have their own companies, (my husband for one), but no one is going to bail out these companies, so why should AIG and all the hedge funds get bailed out?
March 19th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
Man, I really don’t know what I would do. It’s hard to imagine myself in that position. It seems wrong to get a huge bonus when the company did badly, but on the other hand, the bonus was a planed contractual benefit from before the recession. I guess maybe it would be good form to donate the bonus to charity. Giving it back to AIG makes me laugh; the company obviously wouldn’t do anything good with it.
March 19th, 2009 at 4:28 pm
No problem anymore.
The House just passed a new law:
Any company receiving more than $5 Billion in bail-outs, all bonuses paid are subject to 90% income tax.
Bottom line: No one messes with the big Uncle.
March 19th, 2009 at 5:04 pm
Moral of the story – you have to make the mistake to learn from it!
March 19th, 2009 at 5:30 pm
Here’s the deal, The company as everyone know’s recieved a bailout. We all know in the fast year every company that has received a bailout is failing! And like Kim Brown said “hence the word BAILOUT”. BUt how did they get there? Talent is recieving bonus’s for what? Hard earned tax paying dollars paid to person’s who collapsed a companies progress! This means that those who are receiving the bonus’s are those who are not doing a good enough job to keep the company above the water! So where’s the justification in taking a bailout when you know you are the a portion of the problem. I would not take the money, and if I did I would give it back to the company and hope to keep my JOb!!!
March 20th, 2009 at 9:41 am
I guess based on the information I would keep 10% and give back 90% either way if I took the bonus I would have to give it to someone..plus at what cost is it worth keeping..especially if my family was receiving death threats!!
BUT, can you imagine getting $12 million or even $1 million for a bonus..I can’t…