The disingenuousness of the corporate culture is so ingrained, they can't see it. Would anyone in their right mind, say that they'd labor for a calendar year, and actually mean it?
The outrageous spin letter to the head of AIG, loaded with crocodile tears, is a great example of the corporate game.
I take this action after 11 years of dedicated, honorable service to A.I.G. I can no longer effectively perform my duties in this dysfunctional environment, nor am I being paid to do so. Like you, I was asked to work for an annual salary of $1, and I agreed out of a sense of duty to the company and to the public officials who have come to its aid. Having now been let down by both, I can no longer justify spending 10, 12, 14 hours a day away from my family for the benefit of those who have let me down.
Once you can make it past the crocodile tears, it's pretty transparent. Asked to work for ONE DOLLAR a year. Any rational person would easily answer that question with a resounding NO. But we aren't dealing with rational, ethical people.
To ACTUALLY work for a dollar a year would be a noble action, taken by a person who stands behind what they're doing. But our sad, disappointed letter writer feels betrayed. He agreed to work for a dollar, which was a public statement. But the not-so-public back end of the deal, pretty much wipes out Mr. Altruistic's claim.
I'll lay odds on our corporate Joan of Arc didn't hesitate for a second, when asked to "work for a dollar." Because, he knew he wasn't working for a dollar. Once the back end was modified by the government bonus tax, He suddenly, ACTUALLY had to work for a dollar.
My guess is that in October, when you learned of these retention contracts, you realized that the employees of the financial products unit needed some incentive to stay and that the contracts, being both ethical and useful, should be left to stand. That's probably why A.I.G. management assured us on three occasions during that month that the company would "live up to its commitment" to honor the contract guarantees.
The old axiom, there's no honor among theives applies to this statement. Sir Gives-A-Lot drops his bomb. It's about honesty. Integrity. Ethical contracts. How ethical is it to tell people, "Hey everybody, look at me!! I'm working 13 hour days for a DOLLAR! Look at me sacrifice!" That is, as long as his back door deal is ironclad. IT'S ethical, while his dollar salary is symbolic of his struggle against the corporate culture that put us in this situation, which is somehow ethical.
You've now asked the current employees of A.I.G.-F.P. to repay these earnings. As you can imagine, there has been a tremendous amount of serious thought and heated discussion about how we should respond to this breach of trust.
Ah, now we get to the meat and potatoes. Trust. We can't trust your back door deals, and now, our feigned sacrifice has become real. What we wanted people to think about our actions, regardless of the reality we THOUGHT was happening, betrays us.
The public TRUSTED that these people felt so bad about ravaging our economy, guilt by association, act, and deed. Let the little people think we're working for nothing. The TRUST they have in our fake altruism, isn't as important as the TRUST between us charlatan criminals.
The corporate world is so accustomed to our buying their lies, that when you apply common sense to a dripping spin letter, it falls apart.
I won't even comment on his super human charity giving, as he'd not have given out a cent had he gotten his 30 pieces of silver.
We know the scam, Mother Theresa - 1500 cash back just for buying a 30.000 dollar car. While you might just fool stupid people with this dishonesty, most of us aren't buying it.