I've never been very fully employed either but just think of what it's like, you know, to go home with a mortgage payment you know and kids and everything else. My dad had that happen to him in the early '30s.

AIG would be doing fine today. It was one of the ten largest companies in the United States in terms of market value, over 200 billion, the most respected insurer and everything in the world.

We are trading away a little bit of our country all the time for this access consumption that we have over what we've produced. That is not good. I think it's terrible over time. But our country's productive grows enough so we actually can do that, and we'll still be better off. We just don't be as well off as if we hadn't done it.

We intend to continue our practice of working only with people whom we like and admire. This policy not only maximizes our chances for good results, it also ensures us an extraordinarily good time.

Focus on your customers and lead your people as though their lives depend on your success.

If some institution wants to sell you a billion dollars worth of mortgages, they might have to sell 100 million in the market, and then you'll buy the other 900 million on the same terms. Now, the very fact that this has been authorized or will be authorized, I hope, will firm up the market to some degree. And that's fine. But you don't want to have artificial prices being paid.

The dominant factors affecting control valuations are earning power (past and prospective) and asset values.