Banker remuneration has been in the news a great deal lately–Fred Goodwin, the former chief executive of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group has been trying to keep his £703,000 pension despite leading the bank to its decline and subsequent need to be bailed out by the UK government. Merrill Lynch distributed bonuses early last year, and the company is now being investigated to determine whether the early payments encouraged Merrill traders to mark down their portfolios so they could report gains in January. And government bailout money, meant to keep banks solvent, has been used to pay out bonuses–Dresdner Kleinwort in Germany is one example . [...]

Is the global financial crisis motivating people to seek extramarital affairs? Anecdotal evidence from FT columnist Lucy Kellaway suggests this is the case . In the process of doing research for a novel, she found that the adultery-enabling website Illicit Encounters has seen a 300% increase in registrations from London-based men in the financial sector since September. [...]