During the midst of the recession in the past couple of years, a number of people were angry that big bonuses were being paid to professionals whose companies were getting taxpayer-funded bailouts. The rage was seemingly justified, as the Treasury has been found to have approved lavish executive payment.



Still paying a ton to executives



When the Troubled Asset Relief Program was initially started, most people grumbled that American tax dollars were getting used to bail out the large corporations responsible for their own ruin. On top of it, there were executive bonuses still going out despite the belief that the government was paying for every little thing. Nobody seemed to like the program.



The Wall Street Journal reports that about 40 exec payment packages of over $3 million were approved by the Treasury Department. In fact, 16 of them got over $5 million in compensation in 2012. Apparently, the federal government was not too offended that executives were getting paid so much.



Looking at payment packages for the year



Patricia Geoghegan is the person who is in charge of Troubled Asset Relief Program funds and overseeing bonuses. She has been criticizes quite a bit, particularly by Special Inspector General for TARP, Christy Romero. Romero published a report looking at all the payment packages approved by the Treasury.



There was a ton of criticism being handed to the firms that got the most exec payment packages. This involved corporations such as American International Group, Ally Financial and General Motors.



The federal government capped salaries with several variances that might be approved through the TARP program between 2007 and 2012.