I did hear one defender of AIG report that many in the industry are compensated at a subsistence salary and rely on bonuses to be competitive (the example given was $40K salary and $60K bonuses). That doesn’t seem outlandish, and the defender was disingenuous in implying these were what people were complaining about, but your $5K number might need revising up a bit. Some of these guys may owe more in income and property taxes than their base salaries cover. The fellows who are getting $2M retention bonuses mailed to their retirement homes are fair game for the pitchfork mobs, though.

I’m still pretty disappointed that nobody is dumping a load of bricks on S&P yet. They’re the knuckleheads who rated these AIG securities AA, which kept AIG’s rates down and multiples high. If they had rated appropriately, AIG would have been less profitable and less competitive, but they would have had to become more stable to sell their wares to investors. I see S&P as this round’s Arthur Anderson, but it hasn’t hit yet. Unless AIG lied to S&P, but if that were the case Cuomo would be jumping up and down with fists full of indictments.