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Apparent Disparities
NMB, Florida December 21, 2001 A.H. Schectman
THINKING ALLOWED
Essays on Issues, Ideas and Reflections on the Times. Published Now and
Then. Opinions Pro or Con Are Welcome.
APPARENT DISPARITIES
I cannot help but notice the apparent disparities between the compensation
offered for the loss of husbands, wives and family members of the victims of
the Twin Towers' destruction and compensation received by a few people
sitting on Boards of Directors of America's mighty corporations.
We might be impressed by the "average" payment made to the victim's
families if it were not for the knowledge that people at the lower end of
the array of earning potential and etc., would receive less that $10,000.00.
This seems to me to be an exercise of a mathematics class that excludes
emotion and only deals the "facts". I understand some of this but I cannot
understand why the payment of huge amounts (millions of dollars and other
emoluments) to people at the top in business differs so markedly.
I have written before how there are different levels of GREED. Greed, it
seems to me, runs the capitalist system. No one mentions the greed at the
top but they point out the details of the greed at the bottom. If someone
has a pension or health benefits or some equity built up in a job these
things will be deducted from the payment out of the fund amassed to do
justice to the families hurt by the September 11 destruction. How quickly
we forget the individual lives destroyed in an instant. Their families
remain and many are on the point of destitution. Payments to them will be
reduced in the name of accountability.
Can you see what I see? Fat cats get fatter out of profits made on the
payments for goods that are huckstered without pity to the markets of people
who seem only to exist to support a style of life of a corporate boss they
will never see. I see the names and faces reported in the NY Times "A
Nation Challenged" daily. It seems these faces will be put before our eyes
every day forever. These are the ones we know about. There will be many
who will have been obliterated without any trace.
It all seems to be about numbers. Who protests the greedy numbers of
corporate bonuses? Where are the protests about pennies counted in the
recompense of families whose support happened to be at ground zero?
Carol's Evaluation: 9 out of 10.
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