This is a class blog for the students of POLSCI 426: Congressional Politics at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee.

Law Professor Who Advised Obama Says House AIG Bill May Be Unconstitutional

The "AIG Bonus" bill that passed through the House might be doomed. The Senate could sit on it, Obama could veto it, and now it seems the Courts could kill it too.

2 comments:

Nathaniel Haack said...

Much as I would like for these bankers to voluntarily refuse their bonuses (for what great work exactly?), this tax does seem to be out-of-line.

j oddsen said...

It is one thing to put a limit on the amount a salary can be worth of CEO's who head companies who decide to take bailout money. It is quite another to retroactively tax people in order to punish them for past mistakes. Despite the fact that they may not deserve the money, it is unfair to target a group of specific individuals and make a public spectacle of them for political gain. It is my understanding that most of the top beneficiaries of bonuses have given them back and that many of the people who were receiving them were from Europe and are not even American citizens. The law is essentially unconstitutional and its aims our obvious in that it is attempt by lawmakers to appeal to the struggling American by taking away money that totals about one-tenth of one percent of the bailout money given to these companies.

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