I'm upset.
Along with most tax-paying citizens, I find the thought of paying a bonus to anyone in any department at AIG to be simply unfathomable. And don't give me the bit about contract law. I spent 15 years as a corporate attorney, I know the drill. Most of the employees in question are employees at will. Yes, they might be contractually obligated to a bonus, but they are not contractually obligated to a job. For me, the choice would be very, very simple. Take your bonus and walk or forego the bonus and work with us, and the taxpayers who saved your job, and let's turn this thing around.
But more than that, I'm upset that while AIG has received, to date, about 180 Billion in bail out funds (and that's your money folks), apparently without conditions precluding the payment of bonuses, the Senate concurrently saw fit to scale back and whittle down the funding appropriated for schools. So let me get this straight. AIG.....here's a check. A really BIG check. Schools....here's some money, but let's hold off before we do too much more because we're not sure an investment in education is "stimulating" enough.
Fine.
That would be my Exhibit A under the definition of "short sighted thinking."
If AIG fails, we will survive. The country will go on. If our schools continue to fail the millions of children each year who are dropping out, checking out, or doing just enough to get by but are otherwise functionally illiterate and virtually unemployable, then the looming human crisis will make the current capital crisis look tame by comparison. I am not an economist. I have not spent one day on Wall Street. But I think our first priority should be to invest in people. In children. And in the institutions that will dictate our future.
Of course, that's just me.
Maybe I'm wrong.
Maybe I'm just baying into the wind.
But I'm angry, folks.
Really angry.
Along with most tax-paying citizens, I find the thought of paying a bonus to anyone in any department at AIG to be simply unfathomable. And don't give me the bit about contract law. I spent 15 years as a corporate attorney, I know the drill. Most of the employees in question are employees at will. Yes, they might be contractually obligated to a bonus, but they are not contractually obligated to a job. For me, the choice would be very, very simple. Take your bonus and walk or forego the bonus and work with us, and the taxpayers who saved your job, and let's turn this thing around.
But more than that, I'm upset that while AIG has received, to date, about 180 Billion in bail out funds (and that's your money folks), apparently without conditions precluding the payment of bonuses, the Senate concurrently saw fit to scale back and whittle down the funding appropriated for schools. So let me get this straight. AIG.....here's a check. A really BIG check. Schools....here's some money, but let's hold off before we do too much more because we're not sure an investment in education is "stimulating" enough.
Fine.
That would be my Exhibit A under the definition of "short sighted thinking."
If AIG fails, we will survive. The country will go on. If our schools continue to fail the millions of children each year who are dropping out, checking out, or doing just enough to get by but are otherwise functionally illiterate and virtually unemployable, then the looming human crisis will make the current capital crisis look tame by comparison. I am not an economist. I have not spent one day on Wall Street. But I think our first priority should be to invest in people. In children. And in the institutions that will dictate our future.
Of course, that's just me.
Maybe I'm wrong.
Maybe I'm just baying into the wind.
But I'm angry, folks.
Really angry.
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