It's great how he defends the mostly good people in the financial products unit, blaming everything on only 10 bad ones. Tell me, how many of those bad ones get prosecuted?
Soooo....you're really smart, don't like government oversight, can see the train coming, and can do nothing to stop it.
http://blogs.wsj.com/moneybeat/2013/09/ ... e-bonuses/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;Mr. Benmosche on the government’s campaign against partial “bonuses” to be paid to hundreds of employees in the AIG financial-products unit as they unwound massive, ill-fated bets on mortgage bonds. He said “less than 10” employees were behind the bad trades.
“That was ignorance … of the public at large, the government and other constituencies. I’ll tell you why. [Critics referred] to bonuses as above and beyond [basic compensation]. In financial markets that’s not the case. … It is core compensation.
“Now you have these bright young people [in the financial-products unit] who had nothing to do with [the bad bets that hurt the company.] … They understand the derivatives very well; they understand the complexity. … They’re all scared. They [had made] good livings. They probably lived beyond their means. …They aren’t going to stay there for nothing.
The uproar over bonuses “was intended to stir public anger, to get everybody out there with their pitch forks and their hangman nooses, and all that–sort of like what we did in the Deep South [decades ago]. And I think it was just as bad and just as wrong.
“We wouldn’t be here today had they not stayed and accepted … dramatically reduced pay. … They really contributed an enormous amount [to AIG’s survival] and proved to the world they are good people. It is a shame we put them through that.”
Mr. Miller on the compensation controversies at AIG:
“If I had just put $182 billion [into a company], I would not aim to go hire the cheapest management” to repay it.
Mr. Benmosche on the protests against AIG tied to the bonus controversy:
“Employees told me people were trying to follow [them] home. … [They] had to go back roads. Many of them left their homes and stayed with friends and relatives. … The worst example I talk about is somebody in the Midwest. The man was crying when he talked to me. … ‘Could you imagine, in the third grade, my daughter was asked to stand before the whole class? And the teacher said, I want you to know her father works for AIG and he is part of [the company] that brought the country almost to its knees.’
“We’re trying to find the villains [for the financial crisis]. There’s got to be a villain somewhere. The problem is that there isn’t a villain. There are villains. And they are everybody. They are the speculators in real estate. The people who flipped houses. People who lied and cheated [on mortgage applications]. Nobody did the income appraisals. … I include myself in there. I knew stuff was wrong” in the mortgage-underwriting system years before the real-estate bubble burst.
