Letters To The Editor
GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS
White male CEOs your real nemesis
In his July 26 letter (“Affirmative action is discrimination”), Vaughn Simmons decries the plight of the white male worker and blames affirmative action for the lack of jobs and perceived discriminatory practices perpetrated by “self-serving racists.” Simmons also claims the “experiences of life” support his views regarding affirmative action - that it’s “racist and sexist.”
Simmons’ view is simplistic and amounts to nothing more than scapegoating. By attacking women and minorities for the decline in white male earning power, he engages in the same tactics he accuses the “self-serving racists” of using: “fragmentation of interests.”
If Simmons truly wants to point his finger at those who are contributing to the economic decline of the white male, he might do well to start with the white males who dominate corporate America.
It’s unlikely women and minorities are responsible for exporting American jobs to Third World nations where people work for pennies. While Simmons and those who share his limited point of view whine about women and minorities stealing jobs from white males, American CEOs are maximizing profits by exploiting cheap foreign labor. If anyone is leaving the white male worker out in the cold, it is wealthy, powerful white males.
Simmons and like-minded individuals aim their simplistic rhetoric toward the weakest targets while unwittingly supporting the profiteering of corporate America. If anyone is benefiting from the “fragmentation of interests” Simmons describes, it’s American CEOs and shareholders, not minorities and women. Russell Keevy Spokane
Social Security shortchanged
Important considerations are overlooked in Frank Bartel’s July 23 criticism of Social Security (“Lawmakers urged to create privatized retirement”).
Social Security provides more than retirement income. It insures against early disability and, when a person dies prematurely, it supports his family. Bartel’s friends were spared these misfortunes, but good luck doesn’t wipe out their responsibility for a share of the cost.
Payments a private insurance company receives in excess of what is needed for administration and for honoring early claims are used to purchase corporate securities. Money also goes for equipment and employee training, to increase the firm’s earnings and fund eventual repayment. Although the paper trail isn’t well marked, that’s what happens to Social Security taxes. The federal government funds research, soil conservation, highways and education that increase the coming generation’s productivity and make it possible for its people to honor claims of today’s workers.
Investment of Social Security taxes in government bonds to be placed in a trust fund follows the model of private insurance and undoubtedly makes many people feel more secure. But the real Social Security foundation is the nation’s future productivity.
The “rat hole” that should worry Bartel is spending for government projects that don’t conserve or won’t expand the next generation’s productivity, notably spending for military preparedness beyond threats in sight.
Social Security costs more than was projected because people are living longer. This would have happened whether the program was federally or privately administered. The latter arrangement would entail additional costs for competitive advertising and multiple bureaucracies. Frank J. Kottke, professor emeritus Washington State University
Republicans not cutting Medicare
Medicare is 30 years old. According to the experts, it won’t get much older if something isn’t done to fix it!
The Medicare Board of Trustees, which includes three members of President Clinton’s cabinet, has warned us Medicare is in a crisis and will be bankrupt by 2002. That means the end, finis - no more Medicare. That’s only seven years away. What will senior citizens do for health care when it arrives?
What are Democrats proposing? Nothing! They are apparently satisfied to sit and watch. Republicans are trying to fix it, while the Democrats attack them with accusations of them being mean-spirited and uncaring.
Republicans are cutting Medicare. Today, Medicare spending per senior citizen per year is approximately $4,800. The Republican plan would raise Medicare to $6,700 in the year 2002. That’s a cut? It’s an increase of $2,000 and it represents a 6.4 percent increase in funding every year. Inflation is expected to be only in the vicinity of 3 percent and private insurance costs are raising at only 4.4 percent.
The Republican plan is mean-spirited? It’s not!
Republicans are attempting to fix Medicare in spite of the Democrats. Who’s mean-spirited? If the Democrats weren’t, they would stop ignoring the problem and start finding a solution. Jean Bell Springdale, Wash.
Enough of Republicans
I, for one, am fed up with the county commission shoving the Republicans down our throat. They get one candidate elected, then Commissioner Steve Hasson changes parties.
I hope when Sen. Slade Gorton’s term is up, Booth
Gardner will run against him. I would like to see Michael Ormsby run against Rep. George Nethercutt in 1996. Carl Sperr Spokane
Stagnant minimum wage is best
In response to letters written by Dennis Marx (July 23) and Tony Cruse (July 26) regarding the minimum wage, both of those philosophies will get us nowhere.
Mr. Marx’s conclusion, which that we should abolish the minimum wage, will indeed bring us widespread poverty and unemployment. Mr. Cruse’s solution is ultimately no better. By having a minimum wage, a different set of problems is introduced.
If and when the minimum wage goes up, employers can no longer afford to staff as many employees, so employees are laid off. This can cause them to have to go on welfare. Not only that, employers will raise prices, which in turn comes back to the consumer in higher cost of living expenses. Ultimately, inflation goes up and the process starts all over again. Then people will want to increase minimum wage again.
Perhaps a happy medium to the Marx and Cruse solutions would be best: having a minimum wage that won’t increase. John M. Costello Cheney
Higher minimum wage not answer
At the risk of being labeled a “chronic Frank Bartel basher,” I must respond to his recent editorial lamenting the low wage rate/high cost of living problem in Spokane.
His proposed solution of more than doubling the minimum wage is analogous to pouring gasoline on a fire. It’ll simply increase the already high cost of living by forcing businesses to pass their increased wage costs on in the form of increased prices.
While those whose wages will double will be short-term winners, those people who have wages that won’t be affected by this huge increase in the minimum wage, and retirees on fixed incomes, will be huge losers.
The net effects will be to cheapen all jobs above the minimum wage level and put increased pressure for more Social Security increases. There will be less incentive to strive for better jobs because the differential in net income won’t be worth the cost of the extra education, experience and work ethic required.
Thus, employers will have to increase the wages they pay for these jobs to attract qualified employees. This will cause the price of goods and services to jump even further, which will put the people with entry level jobs right back where they started. Only the U.S. dollar will be worth substantially less than it is now.
Frank, did you ever wonder why the Canadian dollar is only worth about 80 cents in U.S. currency? That’s what socialism does for you! Hal Dixon Spokane
EDUCATION
Teach work ethic, social Darwinism
The jobs are there but difficult to get and keep without proper training. Training is apparently not coming out of either our current school system or parental guidance. It seems to take more than that. Even being a good role model is not enough.
Where does anyone get the idea the world or anyone in it, including government, owes them a living? Perhaps we must teach children good work ethics by going back into history, including religious history, to relate morality with survival. There is some benefit knowing survival of the fittest applies not just in the wild animal and plant world but also to people, regardless of race, religion or social factors.
Such lessons are:
“Early to bed, early to rise …” that is, a good day starts with getting up early in the morning.
Be aggressive in pursuing a job; don’t ever give up.
Keep on schedule.
Organize your life around work as much as any other value.
Get educated in all your mind can handle.
Self-esteem is a great aspect of your trade education or profession, but only if it’s generated by yourself, through training and experience. Surely the experts can come up with a program for work ethics training at elementary and high school levels.
The only place where almost anything we want comes before “work” is in the dictionary. Floyd F. Damman Colbert