New AIG head to get at least $7 million annually

So why did we fight a war with England again? So the country, instead of being ruled by one monarch collecting all of our taxes, it could be ruled by several little monarchs that can collect our taxes.

Fucking Capitalism....


New AIG head to get at least $7 million annually

By Jerry White
20 August 2009

In a regulatory filing Monday, American International Group (AIG) disclosed that it would pay its new CEO, Robert H. Benmosche, at least $7 million a year. The 65-year-old former head of the giant insurance and investment firm MetLife will get $3 million in cash and $4 million in stock annually, and be eligible for another $3.5 million in stock as part of an incentive plan.

According to the filing with the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC), the pay package has already received “approval in principle” from Kenneth Feinberg, the Obama administration official who oversees compensation for executives at seven large financial concerns bailed out by the government. AIG received more than $180 billion in taxpayer-funded support—the largest of all the Wall Street bailouts.

Benmosche took over AIG on August 10, replacing Edward Liddy, a member of the board of directors of Goldman Sachs and former head of Allstate. Liddy was appointed by President Bush’s treasury secretary, Henry Paulson, the former CEO of Goldman Sachs, to pay off AIG’s debts and restructure the company.

Of the $180 billion in government aid provided to AIG, at least $13 billion found its way to Goldman Sachs, which held credit default swaps with AIG to insure it against the gambling losses the politically connected Wall Street firm suffered on the subprime mortgage market.

In March 2009, public outrage erupted over Liddy’s decision to pay up to $165 million in executive bonuses, including retention bonuses to the London-based financial unit that was involved in the credit default swaps that bankrupted the company. In response Liddy gave up his bonus and announced he would work for a dollar a year as a “public service.” However, he retained at least $3 million in stocks from Goldman Sachs and was paid nearly half a million in compensation for air travel, housing and other expenses.

Despite the populist posturing by Democratic and Republican politicians, including President Obama, the AIG bonuses went through. It was later revealed that the head of the Senate Banking Committee, Connecticut Democrat Christopher Dodd—who first denied, then admitted to amending earlier legislation to allow the AIG bonuses—had received $160,000 in campaign contributions from employees of AIG.

At the time, White House economic advisor Lawrence Summers insisted that the government, its 80 percent ownership of AIG notwithstanding, could do nothing about the bonuses. “We are a country of law,” he proclaimed. “These are contracts. The government cannot just abrogate contracts.”


http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/aug2009/aig-a20.shtml

run that line past the Native Americans and see what they say about the government and contracts.

:grr: