Like the richest kids hauled to the principal's office, five of the world's billionaire hedge fund managers were called to Congress Thursday for questions about their controversial business, which some have likened to a shadow banking system.

George Soros and the other fund titans didn't face demerits or even expulsion, but the threat of regulation—even punitive regulation—of their highly profitable businesses as lawmakers are seeking to pin blame for the financial meltdown on some identifiable culprits.

Lawmakers delivered a few jabs but there were no fireworks as the five titans were grilled on everything from their compensation to their prescriptions for helping to revive the economy.

Henry Waxman, the California Democrat whose House Committee on Oversight and Reform is holding a series of hearings delving into the financial meltdown, chose Soros, chairman of Soros Fund Management, and the four other hedge principals because each made more than $1 billion last year. The others were James Simons, president of Renaissance Technologies; John Paulson, president of Paulson & Co.; Philip Falcone, senior managing partner of Harbinger Capital Partners; and Kenneth Griffin, chief executive, Citadel Investment Group.

The group responded calmly and confidently, but individually they often mumbled their answers—perhaps showing that they were uncomfortable stepping away from their roles as the supreme behind-the-scenes operators—and drew repeated requests from lawmakers that they speak up and use their microphones.

All five agreed that hedge funds could pose systemic risk to the U.S. economy, and that greater transparency and disclosure could help the economy avoid the problems the current economy is undergoing.

But Waxman and his colleagues had a harder time pinpointing any prescriptions for the 9,000 hedge funds that control $2 trillion, and they certainly didn't get any confessions of culpability from any of the money men. Like everyone else in the financial world, the mega-rich don't take kindly to having their knuckles rapped publicly.

Although he didn't show it, Soros couldn't have been pleased when Indiana Republican Mark Souder loudly scolded him for his funding a program to give sterile needles to heroin and cocaine addicts who risk getting AIDS.

"Your intervention in the drug area is appalling," Souder lectured. "And has done damage to many Americans."

Soros ignored him. Later, Elijah Cummings, a Maryland Democrat, lauded Soros "for everything you've done for the citizens of Baltimore, and noted that his neighbor had asked him how he felt meeting up "with people who have more money than God?"

Whatever reverence Cummings has for Soros didn't prevent him from turning immediately to asking about just how their "staggering" earnings were taxed. He noted that their compensation was taxed at the 15 percent capital gain rate, which is considerably lower than the 25 percent rate that the average teacher or plumber makes.

As Paulson started to reply, Cummings sharply told him to "keep your voice up for my questions!" The most outspoken and the most prone to invoking the benefits that the economy gets from hedge funds, Paulson noted that that lower rate applied only to long-term gains and much of the taxation was at the higher rate.

While others agreed to a higher rate on long-term gains, Paulson demurred.

Clearly conscious of public perceptions, he offered that "virtually all my income is taxed at the highest level."

Falcone chimed in, noting that "98 percent of my income is taxed normally."

Defeated Republican congressman Christopher Shays of Connecticut bored in on how their income should be treated. Soros agreed it should be treated as "regular income."

Then Shays turned to Griffin, whose fund operates out of Chicago, and said he would focus on him because he was the furthest away from his district.

"Have your funds done better than the ones that you have your own money in?" Shays pointedly asked. Griffin said he had several billion in his main funds, and millions more in other funds he managed. Regrettably, he admitted, he has the most exposure to the fund that has performed the worst this year.

Soros offered: "I have one fund and all my assets are in that fund." He noted that he had come out of retirement to save his fortune. And the others all said—under oath—that their personal funds are invested in the funds they manage.

As the hearing wound down—with Simons the only one who ducked out for a break—the men, accompanied by their entourages, mostly fled the cameras in the crowded room through the committee's back entrance. It was unclear how they departed Capitol Hill, but given their financial strata, it was most likely by limo where they could avoid more mixing with the hoi-polloi.