Obama takes aim at Wall Street greed
Updated
US President Barack Obama has criticised big executives on Wall Street who awarded themselves multi-million dollar bonuses, while taxpayers bailed out their industry.
Speaking to reporters in Washington, President Obama described the executives as "shameful and guilty of acute irresponsibility". He said bosses of big finance firms must sacrifice along with other Americans, as the US battles recession.
Speaker: The US President Barack Obama
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BARACK OBAMA: When I saw an article today indicating that Wall Street bankers had given themselves $20-billion worth of bonuses, the same amount of bonuses as they gave themselves in 2004 at a time when most of these institutions were teetering on collapse and they are asking for taxpayers to help sustain them and when taxpayers find themselves in the difficult position that if they don't provide help that the entire system could come down on top of our heads, that is the height of irresponsibility.
It is shameful and part of what we are going to need is for the folks on Wall Street who are asking for help, to show some restraint and show some discipline and show some sense of responsibility.
The American people understand that we have got a big hole that we have got to dig ourselves out of but they don't like the idea that people are digging a bigger hole even as they are being asked to fill it up.
