The AIG executives have the law on their side. Even if it is immoral what they did it is perfectly legal.
The argument being made is we need to keep these people on a payroll because we need their understanding of the situation unwind our responsibilities to counter parties, if they disappear “confidence will be lost” with unpredictable results - essentially, the taxpayers and to some extent perhaps AIG’s management is being blackmailed.
However, there’s nothing that prevents management from playing hardball in return: you pack a conference room with a few dozen or so people who are receiving the really significant performance bonuses, and you lay it out for them:
“You want your bonus checks, fine, if you still want them at the at the end of this meeting ,we’ll hand them to you at the door.
But first you might want to take a close look at the other people sitting behind this table, if you decide to take the bonuses , they are the auditing team were going to be looking at every extant scrap of paper, e-mail, IM and VM message relevant to your performance during the period of evaluation justifying payment for performance.
And if they find anything - anything at all - suggesting that you achieved anything less than 100% compliance with the requirements of your employment contracts, you can rest assured that not only we will see you in court to recoup such payments, but the result of out investigation will be made available to any interested outside party.
Anyway,, that’s it, and those of you who want your checks, exit via the right-hand door...”