NEW YORK - AN angry US public and Congress demanded on Thursday to snip the rip cord on golden parachutes used by fat cat CEOs to escape the mayhem on Wall Street.

Democrats in Congress insisted that an emergency multi-billion dollar government rescue package for the financial system include restrictions on executive pay.

They caught the mood of a nation sickened at watching the titans of finance walk away from Wall Street disasters not only unscathed, but enriched.

'The wealthiest people, those ... in the best position to pay, are being asked for no sacrifice at all,' read a petition to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, which by midday Thursday, after three days, had 31,000 signatures.

The petition, organised by independent Senator Bernie Sanders from Vermont, attacked what it described as the Treasury's attempt to let bungling executives 'continue to make exorbitant salaries and bonuses.'

Gigantic executive pay checks, bonuses, and Midas-like farewells encapsulate what the public sees as Wall Street's ruinous, greed-is-good philosophy.

The CEO of bankrupt Lehman Brothers, Mr Richard Fuld, was paid US$22 million (S$31.3 million) in 2007, including stock options and other compensation, according to a survey published by USA Today.

Mr Martin Sullivan, the chief executive of AIG, who left the insurance giant before it was rescued this month by the federal government, received US$14 million, the survey said.

Even attempts to punish those at the centre of the current chaos are not what they seem.

When the government took over collapsed mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, ousted bosses Daniel Mudd and Richard Syron were not allowed US$12.59 million worth of golden parachute payments.

Yet they still walked away with US$9.43 million in retirement benefits.

Such figures explain the few tears shed by the public at the collapsing finance dominos.

Many are amazed that the government can come up so quickly with more than a trillion dollars in bailouts at a time when growing numbers of ordinary people feel an increasingly painful economic squeeze.

'It's socialism for the rich and dog-eat-dog capitalism for the rest of us,' Ms Naomi Klein, the activist leftist writer, wrote in an e-mailed call for a demonstration later on Thursday near the New York Stock Exchange.

'Think about it: they said providing healthcare for nine million children, perhaps costing US$6 billion a year, was too expensive, but there's evidently no sum of money large enough that will sate the Wall Street pigs.'

The tide appears to have turned strongly against the financiers memorably lampooned as 'Masters of the Universe' in Tom Wolfe's novel, The Bonfire of the Vanities.

Even Forbes, the magazine for and about the rich, says enough is enough.

'The compensation schemes for Wall Street CEOs should be capped to a small fixed amount,' wrote national editor Robert Lenzner.

'The rest should be dependent on performance in a way that does not reward taking greater risk than is prudent. If CEOs don't perform, they should get nothing.'

One worker in the New York finance sector, who asked not to be named, said that his colleagues are as angry as the general public.

'A lot of people are very upset that managers in their own companies and captains of industry in other areas made some really, really bad decisions,' he said.

'The most insulting thing is the golden parachutes where these jackals from Fannie and Freddie, having destroyed the company, walked away with millions ... It all comes down to greed.'