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A pit of quicksand
by Peary Perry |
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I’m
certain there are a huge number of people in this wonderful country
of ours that are much smarter than me. We have lots of folks who have
PHD’s and have studied economics as well as finance , chaos theory
and many other concepts to help explain our method of government as
well as business.
So, these people must know something I don’t know since they keep
coming up with schemes and plans which most of us can tell at first
glance haven’t a snow balls chance in hell of working. Take for instance
this rebate check we’re supposed to be getting. $600 for the single
people and $1200 and some change for the married folks. How long do
you think this is going to last anyone out here in the real world?
I bought gas yesterday and it ate up $60 in the blink of an eye. Driving
around town, not on vacation is costing me $500 a month. All of the
rebate I’ll get will go to gas or to pay for higher prices at the
store. How can the folks in Washington think this is going to somehow
‘stimulate’ the economy? All this is going to do is allow us to pay
some bills that we already owe, not spend it on new stuff. Who can
buy any new stuff? Who can afford to buy any new stuff?
I feel as if I am slowing sinking into a pit of quicksand. Instead
of life getting better for all of us it seems to be getting worse.
I don’t see any change on the horizon by either political party. All
I see is a repeat of the same stuff over and over which changes from
day to day depending on what the polls say. I wish for once we would
have a candidate for one party or another that says what they believe
in and what they think is best for the country regardless of what
their handlers or the polls have to say about it. I don’t think that
will ever happen. They swing with the current winds of opinion. How
sad.
Years
ago, when I had a lot of employees we found a strange reality. If
someone had to leave the company for one reason or another and went
out for unemployment or workers compensation, they would take the
amount they made while on unemployment or on compensation and subtract
that from what ever we were paying them to work. So, let’s just say
the difference was $80 a week. If we tried to get these people to
return to work at their old rate of pay they would refuse and tell
us they could not come back to work for $2.00 an hour. At first we
didn’t understand what they meant, and then they explained. If they
were getting $420 a week for not working, and we wanted them to come
back to work for $500 a week for 40 hours of work, then they were
(in their minds) working those 40 hours for just $80 or just $2.00
an hour, it wasn’t worth their effort. In one state where we had an
operation, the prevailing rate for any workers compensation rate was
higher than what they earned while they were working. It doesn’t take
a rocket scientist to guess that a lot of people hurt their backs
and went to the doctors who advertised on phone book covers for long
term care and rehabilitation. We didn’t stay in that state for very
long.
Today I heard that there is a move afoot to issue a second round of
those $600-$1200 rebate checks since the first ones won’t do much
good to jumpstart the economy. Why not just issue one out to every
American every month? In fact why not just print enough money, save
a million dollars, to give to every American…..that should help, shouldn’t
it?
No, Bunkie, I’m afraid it won’t. Look at what happened to Germany
in the late 30’s. People were carrying German marks around in wheelbarrows
just to buy a loaf of bread. There is this thing called inflation.
We don’t or can’t make the economy grow by handing out money to every
citizen. We make the economy grow by allowing businesses to expand,
develop new products and remain competitive with the rest of the world.
We make the economy grow by eliminating waste and fraud in government
programs and lowering taxes to people and businesses which results
in more dollars available to spend on capital improvements and salaries.
Higher taxes and more governmental giveaways puts us on slippery slope
to a faltering economy and a less competitive society.
We need to encourage achievement and innovation, not penalize someone
because they work hard or think of a new idea or concept. Adopting
punitive practices such as excessive taxation and regulation encourages
not only capital flight but relocation of human assets necessary to
insure a growing economy.
If we want to compete in a global world we need to think about how
best to do so before it is too late. |
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