Wall Street Patrimony

One day a fourth-grade teacher asked the children what their fathers did for a living.

All the typical answers came up--fireman, mechanic, doctor, garbageman, corporate robot, lawyer, etc.

Little Paulie was being uncharacteristically quiet, he was congenitally a good talker.

So when the teacher prodded him about his father, he reluctantly dragged himself out from behind his desk and took his place at the head of the class.

"My father's an exotic dancer in a gay cabaret and takes off all his clothes in front of other men and they put money in his underwear."

"Sometimes," he concluded, "if the offer is really good, he will go home with a man and spend the night with him for money."

The teacher, gobsmacked by this abbreviated curriculum vitae, hurriedly set the other children to work on some exercises and then took little Paulie aside.

"Is that really true about your father, Paulie?"

"No," the boy said.

"My father is Henry Paulson, Secretary of the Treasury and former CEO of Goldman Sachs. So I made up a story that would be less embarrassing."

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