The New York Times is reporting that the government has approved a plan to “stabilize” Citigroup. MarketWatch also has some details. The plan includes a $20 billion cash injection via preferred stock with an 8% dividend. The government also gets to approve executive compensation, but I repeat, how do these folks deserve anything other than severance pay. They got greedy and earned the most in the good times. If they were the reason for the rise they can’t now claim they couldn’t stop the fall.

It’s also been said that the executives suffer because the compensation is in stock which is down. Well, in this case the stock may have been diluted, but it was saved and they aren’t the reason it’s not at zero.