Letters to the editor

Microeconomics

Huge discrepancies between paydays? Check with the boss

Editor, The Times:

Regarding "Starbucks eliminates 600 jobs" [Times, Business, Feb. 22], concerning the Starbucks Corporation nixing 600 jobs, most of which are in the Seattle area: I realize this world is runs on checks and balances. Money buys most everything these days, and to meet the bottom line, companies sometimes need to make tough decisions that do not benefit the workers.

However, while I do not know the exact salary of a Starbucks big wig, I think it safe to assume it is somewhat larger than that of the average barista ["Workers' earnings fall 1.2% over last year," Business, Feb. 20].

I read articles in the paper about companies firing thousands of workers, and then I hear reports of the CEOs of those same corporations raking in yearly salaries that seem, to me at least, ungodly ["Ex-Starbucks CEO gets $1.25 million severance," Business, Jan. 29 and "Despite heat, pay at the top kept going up," Business, June 24, 2007].

Sometimes I wonder, whom do these layoffs serve? Why do they need to happen when they can easily be solved by cutting the CEOs' bloated salaries?

Our economy is in bad enough shape without more people losing more jobs ["Groceries, health care, energy costing us more," Business, Feb. 21]. I think we'd be a lot better off if the heads of our corporations were more concerned with their workers and less concerned with their profits.

— Dillon Trethewey, Seattle

Onerous low interest

"That $500,000 rambler" [editorial, Feb. 19], in praise of the virtues of the planning and restrictions that result in half-million-dollar bungalows in King County, left out a few other of the effects — like hundreds of thousands of lower-wage earners who will never be able to afford one of these wonderful homes.

Where do you expect the legions of workers who support your elitist, snobbish, intellectual [selves] in your perfect little Northwest lifestyle to live? Comfortably out of sight in the far reaches of South Pierce or East Snohomish counties? So now Seattle and environs are the comfortable, orderly domain of upper-class, predominantly white, highly paid types.

Where you see planning and protecting the "Northwest character," I see snobbery, elitism and class apartheid.

— Scott Robertson, Buckley, Pierce County

We can do without

Thank you, King County, for my 2008 property-tax bill, which is 11 percent higher than my 2007 bill. Taken together with the 10 percent increase for 2007, my property taxes have increased 22 percent in the past two years.

As an added bonus, each of my tax bills includes more than $100 for the Port of Seattle, an agency known to be inept and corrupt ["Steakhouse deal: How Port allegedly broke laws, hid costs from public," Local News, Jan. 25].

I would like to send a message to King County Executive Ron Sims and Gov. Christine Gregoire not to expect my vote in any upcoming election. As a Democrat, I look forward to giving each of you your walking papers and voting for more responsible public officials.

I will also continue to resist your continuing efforts to pile on additional fees, taxes and tolls for services already well-funded by existing taxes (was Gregoire really serious about a $7 toll on the 520 bridge?? ["520 gets closer to tolls," Local News, Feb. 23.]

Tim Eyman, thanks for bringing some sanity to car tabs and sponsoring an initiative to require state audits. Consider me one of your foot soldiers in the fight to rein in these tax scoundrels!!

— Roger Van Der Vliet, Bellevue

Rich in absurdist sense

WOW... I mean, really, WOW! Sound Transit can spend away 15 times my annual salary in tax dollars on art for one station! [" 'Big Rig Jig' artist lands Sound Transit gig," page one, Feb. 23.] Am I upset? Do I feel the public trust in spending taxpayers' money is being abused? Will I forever vote NO on any ballot issue to raise property taxes? The answer is an absolute yes to all three questions. This is ridiculous!

Any public art installed in taxpayer-funded facilities should be by local artists, should change on a regular basis, and should never be paid for. The spaces should be places where local artists can make application to install their works for a limited time. Spaces should be set aside for our schools and colleges for students to install collaborative works.

I will get more joy out of the coloring contests at local supermarkets. The idea that transit riders could be forever looking at something like two big rigs welded together over their heads for all time is stupidity in its best performance!

— Carl Wilson, Seattle

A frugality we can't afford

It's hard to understand why conservatives would attack Rep. Adam Smith's Global Poverty Act ["Smith: Poverty act critics' real target is Obama," Local News, Feb. 21].

That bill, co-sponsored by 84 U.S. House members — including Reps. Norm Dicks, D-Bremerton; Jay Inslee, D-Bainbridge Island; Rick Larsen, D-Lake Stevens; Jim McDermott, D-Seattle; and Dave Reichert, R-Auburn — simply requires that U.S. foreign-aid policy and programs be aligned with the Millennium Development Goals our nation approved in 2000 with 190 other nations in a commitment to improve life for the world's poorest people.

The platforms of both major parties address the need to reduce poverty. President Bush outlined his plan to help the world's poor in March 2002 at the U.N. Financing for Development Conference at Monterrey, Mexico: "We fight against poverty because hope is an answer to terror. We fight against poverty because opportunity is a fundamental right to human dignity. We fight against poverty because faith requires it and conscience demands it. And we fight against poverty with a growing conviction that major progress is within our reach."

Rep. Smith's bill, introduced in the Senate by Barack Obama, D-Ill., and Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., wouldn't even cost any new money. It calls for our global assistance, now spread over 25 separate budget accounts, to be managed more efficiently in order to reduce poverty and hunger, encourage sustainable economic development, and help create a more stable world.

— Dick Nelson, coordinator, Puget Sound Millennium Goals Project, Seattle

Breaking even

It's pretty ironic, isn't it? It looks like we'll be using our "economic stimulus package" to pay what we owe on taxes. That's life in the middle-class lane, I guess.

— Julie Hagen, Maple Valley