Fat Cats to Be Bailed Out...

From a recent speech by Rep. Henry Waxman, Dem-Los Angeles, about the Bailout:

"...the CEOs of the 500 largest American companies received an average of $15 million each in the year 2006, and that was a 38 percent increase in just one year," Waxman said. "In 1980, CEOs were paid 40 times the average worker; today they are paid 600 times more."

Waxman said that while most Americans live "in a world where there are real economic consequences" to failure, "it seems like CEOs hit the lottery when their companies collapse." Just this year, Wachovia's Ken Thompson (pictured above) left the company with an exit package worth more than $5 million. Over at Citigroup, Chuck Prince (shown below) was forced out and given a golden parachute of $16 million.

According to Bloomberg News, the top five firms on Wall Street paid out more than $3 billion to top executives in the past five years. All of those executives worked at firms that were involved in selling the mortgage-backed securities at the heart of the current crisis.

These payouts have occurred at a time when the average net compensation for workers in the United States has been about $40,000, according to a May survey by the U.S. Department of Labor." more - *Also See Newsweek, What they Got Away With

* Update 10/08/08 : AIG Executives go on $440,000 company-sponsored vacation after bailout

"The eyes of our citizens are not sufficiently open to the true cause of our distress. They ascribe them to everything but their true cause: the banking system... a system which if it could do good in any form is yet so certain of leading to abuse as to be utterly incompatible with the public safety and prosperity." - Thomas Jefferson

"You are a den of vipers and thieves. I intend to rout you out, and by the Eternal God, I will rout you out. If the American people only understood the rank injustice of our money and banking system, there would be a revolution before morning. If the central bank continues to control our currency, receiving our public monies, & holding thousands of our citizens in dependence, it would be more formidable & dangerous than the naval & military power of the enemy." - Andrew Jackson (the guy on the $20 bill)