[thematt]

The bonuses are huge because the numbers are huge and not everybody can do it.

The so-called "marginal value to society" is relative. I might not think your job at the electronic trading shop provided much value to society, but that doesn't mean somebody else didn't. I would bet many of Goldman's clients feel they're providing a great value, otherwise they wouldn't be clients.

The only valid reason for people to be mad is because tax-payer money was used to provide them with liquidity during the financial crisis. That money has since been paid back (with interest), so I have no problem with Goldman paying out whatever they want to their employees now. In retrospect, I'm of the opinion the US government should have demanded equity in return for the loan, but that's water under the bridge at this point. I'm not a shareholder, so GS can pay whatever they want to their employees.

[SkyMarshal]

>The only valid reason for people to be mad is because tax-payer money was used to provide them with liquidity during the financial crisis. That money has since been paid back (with interest),

Was the $800B stimulus paid back? What about the two (and counting) rounds of QE the Fed has implemented (there will be consequences to such huge intervention, it's just not clear exactly what yet)? The financial crisis cost us a great deal more than just TARP.

[littlegiantcap]

The stimulus mostly went to states, I'm not sure if any of it even went to Goldman Sachs. I'm also not sure it's entirely fair to say 1 bank's compensation package should be called into question because of a worldwide recession. Let the shareholders decide what's appropriate.

[SkyMarshal]

It doesn't matter where the stimulus went, but the fact that it was needed at all to prevent (or forestall) a second Great Depression. Of course, the whole idea behind the stimulus was to keep people paying their mortgages so that the trillions of MBS's in the system wouldn't default and bankrupt the banks, pensions, and whatever else had bought them over the years. Basically, another form of bailout for the banking system.

[thematt]

Nonsense, it absolutely does matter. The government gave them money and they paid it back with interest, end of story. If you think the banks should continually be "punished" for some indeterminate amount of time as a result of economic conditions they may or may not have caused, then that should have been a condition of accepting the money...but it wasn't. So go complain to your congressman, your senator or your president, but as far as I can tell the recipients followed the letter of the law...so I have no bone to pick with them now.