Rewarding Failure

We all threw a hissy fit when AIG spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on a spa getaway for special clients and staff. As far as I'm concerned those pampered souls could have worked up a good sweat shoveling my snow and then enjoyed a comfortable cool down taking turns in my bathtub/shower. We don't do foot treatments, but if you aren't quick putting on a sock you might get a disgusting lick from the dog. (We change socks quickly around here.)

Now it is becoming known, despite attempts to shroud it all in secrecy, that many of the receivers of bank bailout monies spent quite a bit of that cold cabbage on hefty executive bonuses. That is, $1.6 billion to be shared among 600 bankers. This without so much as a thank you to taxpayers, which would include the underpaid management of Rougman's Resort and Spa.

From Investor's Business Daily:

On Sunday, the Associated Press found that $1.6 billion of bailout cash was converted to gravy for 600 bankers. They got bonuses, club dues, financial planners, corporate jet travel, daily limousines and home security systems, courtesy of the taxpayers.

This is a bad sign of what's ahead if failure continues to be rewarded and government keeps propping up uncompetitive companies and industries in crisis.

$1.6 billion is small change in comparison to the total amount of bailout money being tossed around like so much green confetti at the moment, but it is by itself a huge amount of cash, larger than Michigan's projected budget shortfall for this fiscal year.

If added compensation is a reward for good performance, the bankers have just been given 1.6 billion kudos courtesy of US taxpayers. At $1 apiece, that would net you a whole boatload of struggling auto executives who, by the way, seem to have chosen the wrong vocation.