Money and mathematics

For those who worried about Perelman missing out on a million dollara, here is an example of the sort of money some can make by quitting mathematcs (coutesy gene expression):
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_34/b3998412.htm
Excerpts:
"James H. Simons, the former math professor who founded the $12 billion quantitative shop Renaissance Technologies Corp., pocketed an estimated $1.5 billion last year. That was thanks to the 5% in fees and nearly 44% of profits that Renaissance docks its investors (vs. traditional hedge funds' typical "2 and 20"). Clients don't complain; Renaissance's leading fund has returned 35%, after fees, since 1989".
Simons was a professor mathematics at SUNY (Stoney Brook) and was doing quite well (still lots of papers on Chern-Simons invariants) when he moved to financial investment. Apparently, some of these companies pay newcomers 250,000 US dollars an year plus bonus. Being good on mathematics seems to help in getting jobs in these companies.

Update:
There is avery interesting article in the Newyorker explaining some of the politics involved in mathematical circles and Perelman's refusal to accept the Fields medal:
http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/060828fa_fact2
The article may suggest that some thing is strange about Chinese mathematics but this kind of controversies and postings of incomplete proofs and changing them have been going for some time ( see various papers on Tarski problems). See also:
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/fundamentals/mg19125661.400
In this kind of atmosphere, Perelman is impressive and this comes out very well in the Newyorker article. His attitude seems to be that even honest mathematicians are putting up with dishonest practices and he wants no part in these politics.