You attack Comptroller John Liu for reporting the truth — the fact that one-third of New Yorkers are unable to retire is absolutely true (“The Unions’ Edge,” Editorial, Jan. 30).
Social Security benefits average about $1,200 per month. A safe return on $10,000 of savings is about 1% or $100 per year.
The total income for a New Yorker with an average Social Security benefit would be about $14,500 per year.
Liu realizes that many people depend on Social Security because it makes up the huge bulk of their income, and he takes it into consideration in his report.
Does The Post really believe that a New Yorker can retire and live an economically secure life on an income of $14,500?
Mel Aaronson, Chairman
UFT Pension Committee, Manhattan
An $800B mistake
For all his research on the stimulus bill, Michael Grabell misses the point (“How the $800B Stimulus Failed,” PostScript, Jan. 29).
He mocks the conservative critique that “Keynesian economics is obsolete.”
Keynesian economics has never been proved valid, and today’s policies would have horrified John Maynard Keynes.
He advocated temporary deficits to stimulate investment, not the chronic fiscal hemorrhaging we now accept as normal.
Today’s Democrats use his name as a fig leaf, but their policies reveal a belief that spending is a good in itself. The stimulus was an $800 billion credit card, so they went shopping.
Bill Ireland
Ontario, Canada
Grabell attributes the stimulus misfires to marketing screw-ups, roll-out blunders and other project slip-ups.
He fails to see the basic flaw of massive government spending per Keynsian principles for killing recessions.
This type of spending worked during the Depression, when the unemployed were all craftmen, tradesmen or farmers and were all male, homogeneous, organized and with immediately transferrable skills.
This stimulus initiative has been confronted with a demographic comprised of the self-employed, females and people with high- and low-tech skills.
While the president sought out shovel-ready projects, the private-sector unemployed were not shovel-skilled or organized in any fashion to be applied to such projects.
They’re still unemployed, while the stimulus effort shifted to organized workers in the public ranks who support the GDP by spending tax dollars rather than creating goods or services.
Michael Mainelli
The Bronx
Any massive spending program should be accompanied by a plan to pay the money back, but that has never happened in the history of the United States.
So the economy will have to absorb this massive spending and borrowing debt.
At best, this will lead to inflation down the road and an accompanying contraction in the economy.
We cannot continue to live off borrowed money. The consequences will be too severe.
Ralph Thomas
Portland, Ore.
Get pumped!
When George W. Bush was president, I recall Sen. Chuck Schumer out in front of gas pumps with righteous indignation about the $4 price.
Now the cat’s got his tongue. Is Schumer afraid of the Obama administration or does he need a GPS to find a gas station? I’ll lend you mine, Senator.
C. Carriero
Norwalk, Conn.