It’s bonus time again at AIG. America’s favorite charity, to which we gleefully contributed $180 billion, is set to hand out bonuses to 40 of their best go-getters. Unlike the gargantuan payouts of a few months ago, this is a paltry $2.4 million in bonus money.

It doesn’t seem like all that much, unless you consider that $2.4 million divided by just 40 employees means that these guys will be taking home a cool sixty grand a piece, on top of their regular salary. $60,000 is more than a lot of people make in a year. Let me take it one step further – $60,000 is more than a lot of hard working people who did NOT directly contribute to the collapse of the American economy make in a year.

What could these individuals have contributed that would justify such bonuses? These are deferred bonuses from 2008, meaning that these were ‘earned’ based on their performance as the company was falling billions of dollars into the red. Maybe these men and women are heroes in their own rights. Maybe AIG would have needed a $190 Billion or $200 Billion bailout if these bonus-worthy champions hadn’t done whatever it was that they did to prove themselves so valuable. But I don’t think so.

Continuing the proud tradition of making a bad thing worse by intervening in commerce, the federal government is now in the business of reviewing executive compensation. President Obama has appointed a Compensation Czar (no, I’m not making that up; that is a real position paid for by your tax dollars) to look into the salaries and bonuses earned by companies that are coming under the control of the United States government.

Of course, the Compensation Czar is powerless to do anything in this case because the bonuses were promised back in the carefree days before such a position even existed. The best we can hope for is another round of hand wringing and public vilification followed by complete and total inaction by the government. But the NEXT time a huge multination corporation fails and is bailed out by the government, just you watch.

Every time I check the news, I get bombarded with analysts that are terrified about the economy.  There are one thousand Chicken Littles running around sparking fear.  Let’s get them back into the hen house.

For starters, no one is certain about what will happen to the economy, and that is scary. Change and the unknown are very scary, and that is why suspense movies make you jump out of your seat. Currently, we are in one of these movies without a script.

Why should we not be afraid? The economy moves in natural cycles. The “Roaring Twenties” was capitalizing on the stock market. People were making fortunes off of their portfolios. Then the market crashed, and all those that were over-leveraged were left with nothing. The ripple effect carried throughout the masses, and the panic further hurt those doing well and businesses collapsed. This in turn resulted in lost jobs and ultimately the Great Depression.

Then the US auto and steel industry was insanely powerful. Millions of jobs and vast economic booms were experienced. Foreign competitors kicked our complacent butts and that industry collapsed again crushing the populace. Now there is something similar happening with oil prices and the housing industry which were booming in the recent past.

Again we got over-leveraged. Greedy companies were passing out credit as if it were in the “take-a-penny” tray. We were greedy and took the credit and bought useless things that we could not afford. Mortgage companies gave us loans that forced us way out of our means. The companies experienced a boom in sales. The GDP was up and everyone was officially winning.

Until…the rise in oil prices. Now, our paycheck to paycheck strategy was collapsing. The banks started suffering and wanted their money to pay for their expenses. Interest rates were raised on the adjustable rate loans, and people began losing their homes.  They got over-leveraged.

Why shouldn’t we be afraid? Every single financial crisis in our history has been overcome, and each time we have come back even stronger.

What are you doing to protect your fiancial futures? What advice can you give our readers?

With real estate markets in a downward spiral and many Americans having upside down mortgages (owing more than their homes are worth), a recent study by Forbes seems appropriate.

Forbes studied the 150 largest housing markets in America, and using data from the US Census and the National Association of Realtors, they created a list of the 50 communities with the highest amount of homeowner debt.  For this study, they looked at the median house price, percent the house value changed since 2007,  number of outstanding mortgages, houses that had second mortgages or home equity loans, and houses that had both second mortgages and home equity loans.  Studying all of this data they compiled their list.

Sacramento, California, was found to be the community with the most homeowner debt.  Did your community make the list?

Click here to read the whole article.

With all of those mortgage deals that just keep getting “better and better”, you never know what companies to trust! Are these offers a version of false advertising? Thrifty Mortgages can help you decide what companies to trust or invest in. At Thrifty Mortgages, you can compare the latest mortgage and remortgage offers in the UK.

On their homepage, Thrifty Mortgages provides articles about the new offers on the market. There are articles about good mortgage companies and also some that warn against companies. For instance, there is an article about how the IVA Council has been mailing people in debt and advising them to default on their repayments–a lure that will probably actually make people become bankrupt.

In a rush? Well, even if you only have a few minutes to read about mortgages, Thrifty Mortgages can help you out. To make your life easier, each of the articles has a word-count and an estimated reading time! Most of the articles will take you about a minute and a half to read.

People are always looking for the best mortgage rates, which is why remortgages have become popular. However, without sites like Thrifty Mortgages untrustworthy companies could be drawing in uninformed or innocent customers. To educate people even more about their mortgages, Thrifty Mortgages has information about bad credit mortgages. They even explain how remortgages could help to solve your bad credit mortgage problems.

Don’t be drawn in by false advertising of mortgage rates. At Thrifty Mortgages, you can learn more about mortgages, remortgages, bad credit, and more–for free!

Recently, I went through a divorce. Part of my divorce proceedings was that I had to refinance the mortgage on my house and make an equity payment to my ex-wife. The biggest pain of this process was finding the correct loan and the correct mortgage company to work with. Looking online left me with a stream of options and all of it seemed very confused. That is when I found LoanNetwork.com

LoanNetwork.com is a resource site for home-owners and home-shoppers to help them navigate the confusing world of mortgages. They have a resource area that is filled with articles and information about points, rates, and credit scores. All of the topics that consumers find confusing can be cleared up while reading at LoanNetwork.com

But the core utility at LoanNetwork.com is their mortgage comparison engine. You put in all of your information about the type of loan you are looking for and they give you a list of loans and mortgage companies that will be able to help you. It doesn’t matter if you are looking for “no money down” options or cash out refinancing, they have mortgage companies that will be able to help you.

So the next time you are home shopping or it is time to refinance your existing mortgage, you should visit LoanNetwork.com.