Bailed-Out Bank Execs Made $1.6B Last Year

Banks that are getting taxpayer bailouts awarded their top executives nearly $1.6 billion in salaries, bonuses, and other benefits last year, an AP analysis reveals. Benefits at bailed-out institutions like Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, and JPMorgan Chase included cash bonuses, stock options, personal use of company jets and chauffeurs, home security, country club memberships, and professional money management.

The rewards came even at banks where poor results last year foretold the economic crisis that sent them to Washington for a government rescue. Barney Frank, the House Financial Services committee chair and a long-standing critic of executive largesse, said the bonuses amount to a bribe "to get them to do the jobs for which they are well paid in the first place.” (More Wall Street bailout stories.)