<p>The Institute should be proud. He is courageous, articulate and, in my view, entirely correct.</p>
<p>His resignation letter, castigating AIG and the politicians, is printed in today’s NYT.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/25/opinion/25desantis.html?ref=opinion[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/25/opinion/25desantis.html?ref=opinion</a></p>
<p>Interesting letter. One of my best friends is a VP for an AIG company and is suffering from the stigma right now, and it’s awful.</p>
<p>But, in my opinion, I simply don’t care HOW HARD YOU THINK YOU WORK, a bonus of a millions dollars (750k after taxes) is obscene. That kind of wealth is obscene. </p>
<p>("I know that because of hard work “I have benefited more than most during the economic boom and have saved enough that my family is unlikely to suffer devastating losses during the current bust.”)</p>
<p>I don’t feel sorry for many on Wall St. There are so many honorable people out there working equally hard, and much harder, for much less. </p>
<p>People crying into their soup because they have to sell their second home, trade in their BMWs or the like need to get some perspective on how most of the people in this world live.</p>
<p>Rant over…</p>
<p>I guess you didnt read that part explaining that he agreed to work for a salary of $1. And apparently you glossed over the fact that AIG and the government promised this bonus to him so that he would stay on and help sell the business unit that he headed [which was not involved in the credit default swaps]. And, obviously, you were not impressed with the fact that he performed his end under this agreement and sold the business unit which raised cash and will help the government’s plan to restructure and repay the government debt. </p>
<p>Obviously you can ignore the facts and allign yourself with the lying, posturing policians if you want and you can do it for no rational reason.</p>
<p>What I cant get past, however, is your statement that $700,000 is “obscene.” You know obscenity when you see it right? Not a very principled test is it? And who is to apply the “obscenity” test of compensation? You? The buffoons in Congress? Some new bureaucracy that sets wages for everyone? Try telling that to the Teamsters and say hi to Jimmy Hoffa when you meet up with him. And, btw, noone has the right to renege on a deal after the employee has performed. </p>
<p>Maybe you ought to reconsider your knee-jerk classist reaction.</p>
<p>I am classist. I categorically find wealth selfish and obscene. This is my opinion. I have a right to it, you have a right to yours.</p>
<p>$1 for a years work, after making millions, doesn’t strike me as particularly self-sacrificing, especially when he anticipated he would get a million dollar bonus down the road. </p>
<p>I don’t think this guy is a bad person, I think a society that values and supports this kind of earnings inequity has a fundamental problem. </p>
<p>Obscene is clearly in the eye of the beholder. That’s why I prefaced my remarks with “in my opinion”. Clearly, I don’t value what you, perhaps, or this man value. Money isn’t what I value. A nice car, expensive home, and all that go with wealth isn’t what I value. My own income could be three times what I currently make if I worked private sector and not with the underserved. I could be wealthy. I choose not to be wealthy. I value different things</p>
<p>I think you have little idea of my “class” or profession. You might be surprised. </p>
<p>That’s my opinion. You are welcome to yours.</p>
<p>I said your comments were uninformed, unprincipled and classist. I didnt know or comment, at the time, on your “class”. </p>
<p>Hopefully you will learn at some point that bitterness and jealousy of “Wall Street” wont help with any of the financial issues that you have with putting your kids through school.</p>
<p>I’m done.</p>
<p>I am in no way “jealous” of the wealth of Wall Street. I have absolutely no desire for that kind of money. I’m a senior in college right now, and when I graduate I could (well, could have, several years ago) easily get a job that pays 3 times what my parents earned as they raised me, and I honestly have NO IDEA what I would do with that much money.</p>
<p>And I don’t want it. It’s not even a question of value, it’s that I simply do not have any interest in making a lot of money.</p>
<p>So no, I’m not bitter or jealous, but I completely agree with Jamie that there is a serious problem with the way that compensation works in this country. For example: in theory, unions are a wonderful thing, but as an avid baseball fan I can name at least one that has destroyed a national pastime.</p>
<p>I’m not sure I would go as far as to use the word “obscene,” but yeah, I definitely agree- zero pity for people no longer making millions of dollars a year.</p>
<p>There are people in this world that make less than 365 dollars a year (as in, less than one dollar a day) and when I graduate I want to find a job helping those people. How much do you suppose I’ll make?</p>
<p>For anything op-ed in the New York Times, read the comments by readers (sorted by most recommendations) for varying and critical opinions.</p>
<p>[Dear</a> A.I.G., I Quit! - Readers’ Comments - NYTimes.com](<a href=“http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2009/03/25/opinion/25desantis.html?s=3]Dear”>http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2009/03/25/opinion/25desantis.html?s=3)</p>
<p>Seems like mia305’s views are limited. In addition, the aggressive tone of mia305’s posts to Jamiecakes were unnecessary.</p>
<p>Why mention that Mr. Desantis agreed to work for $1 dollar when he knew he was going to make much more.</p>
<p>Here’s one of the most recommended comments:</p>
<p>“Mr. Desantis does realize that while he takes credit for agreeing to work for $1, he reveals that he was indeed relying on not working for $1 by fully expecting the bonus payment. Just wanted to point out the disconnect there.”</p>
<p>I agree with mia305. I’m a student at MIT right now. I want to go into academia because I love research. However, the only reason I would ever go into finance would be to make a **** ton of money. If someone brought me in to clean up a situation I never created at a pay of $1, and promised me a bonus to compensate me for my hard work, I damn well would expect that bonus. </p>
<p>Oh and there are jobs out there that deserve far more than $100k per annum, or other absurd rewards. Think about tenured professors right now. They don’t have to do ***<em>. They don’t *have</em> to write grant proposals. They just do so that they can continue doing interesting stuff. They could literally put a kiddy pool in their office and float in it all day and get paid doing that. </p>
<p>What really ****ed me off is that the idiot attorney general of NY threatened to name names, knowing full well that the public had effectively transformed into a lynch mob. People elected to such positions should be respected if they have the sense to keep a cool head in hot times, not if they transform into populist driven monsters.</p>
<p>Mr. Desantis works in AIG for numerous years and have earned a ton of obscene money in the process. Although he did not create the mess, as he said, his division, AIGFP did screwed up royally and created a total meltdown of not just AIG but the world financial system. While the cuprites who created the mess have took their fat bonuses and now gone, Mr. Desantis and some who remained where so magnamious to stay on to clean up the mess for only a $1. Wow, if that was true, I truely think that Mr. Desantis and the rest are saints. </p>
<p>If he is so magnamious as he said he is, why doesn’t he just said that, hey, I am grateful to have my job and the current salary. I will stay as long as you need me to help clean up the mess that someone else created. Instead, he demanded exhorbitant retention bonus. He and those who stay knows that AIG needed them badly, and they used this opportunity to negotiate a contract that is essentially a Ransom note. Pay us big fat bonus all we all will quit and AIG will fall. These people are Financial Terrorist who held AIG hostage. He and the rest should be ashamed of themselves and they all should be treated like terrorist.</p>
<p>I don’t know how I feel about the financial sector. I go to school with the “best and the brightest” future wall-streeters. & frankly, I’ve always been more impressed by the science/math majors here than the business ones. This whole bonus debacle is overhyped crap though.</p>
<p>@Making<em>a</em>point: A company like AIG is not like a country. When you fight a war to defend from invasion, then it makes sense to fight to the death, etc. AIG is just a company. He has enough money in the bank and better things to do with his life than try to rescue the sinking AIG. He stayed on because he thought, gee, I’ll get not as much money (his annual salary was probably a lot more than the bonus he got) as I could have gotten at some of the other offers I had, but I’ll try and stick it through. </p>
<p>I wouldn’t throw the word financial terrorist around so easily. As the media and the president himself has explained, there are two sides to this problem, and part of it was that man middle-class folks bought homes and other things they definitely could not afford.</p>
<p>@Pebbles: A lot of mathematicians/physicists/computer-scientists are the ones going into the financial markets and making a killing. Buisness is very different from finance. The latter rewards those who are much more analytical/mathematically oriented.</p>
<p>Ben Bernanke went to MIT. The Fed is in good hands.</p>
<p>Well, that’s a good point. There is a surprising flow of mathematicians and physicists (at least in name) into the sector. But it’s not decoupled from business, certainly. Just count the number of management majors that accept offers from investment banks every year. Maybe not this year.</p>
<p>Anyways, it’s a trivial point. In the end, all this outrage is getting kind of old for me. I don’t see the point of begrudging someone a lifestyle that you decided against for yourself. Some people get to be rich and others don’t. An MIT education empowers us to make that choice for ourselves and I’m pretty grateful for that. In terms of policy-making, though, I don’t find these people more indispensable than anyone else.</p>
<p>Pebbles: I don’t think it is a matter of begrudging anyone their wealth. I don’t. I just don’t feel sorry for them right now. And I don’t think working for a million dollar bonus is particularly noble.</p>