Program affects teachers, too
This letter is in response to Joseph Appleton’s letter to the editor published in WHT June 28. The provision that Mr. Appleton referred to is called WEP (The Windfall Elimination Provision). Indeed, it does affect retirement benefits for policemen and firemen, but it also affects teachers’ benefits.
To my discredit and the total of my monthly retirement benefit, I did not find out about WEP until after I retired from teaching and discovered that my monthly Social Security benefit had been reduced several hundred dollars a month due to WEP. The provision is especially detrimental to teacher-retirement because teachers may not bolster their retirement benefits through overtime.
Policemen and firemen are allowed to add to their pre- and post-retirement benefits through the accumulation of overtime. There is no financial benefit provided to teachers at any time for the monumental amount of overtime work they put in. Several presidents, since Reagan’s administration created WEP, have promised to act to have WEP revoked, including President Obama.
We are still waiting. Our government has repeatedly raided our Social Security fund and further insults us by trying to balance Social Security on our financial backs while removing more and more of us from the middle-class to the struggling poor.
Paula Kamiya
Waikoloa
Mahalo to my patients!
Thank you to all of my wonderful patients who have entrusted me with their care for the last many years. Also, to my colleagues at Kaiser Permanente and Kona Community Hospital for the memories I will carry with me into retirement.
The gifts, hugs, cards, and expressions of love have been received and greatly appreciated.
A hui hou!
David Kwiat
Kailua-Kona
Veto bad move
Again, our governor proves he should be selling used cars instead of pretending to govern by vetoing House Bill 1850, which would have allowed Airbnb, Home Away and VRBO to collect taxes on behalf of the state from vacation rental hosts. This would have put millions of dollars into the state bank account. People who were not paying their TAT tax would have been paying the amount owed fair and square.
Everybody wins. Think of all the air conditioners the extra tax money could have purchased for the whining school districts on Oahu. We don’t want our children breaking a sweat in class. We want a perfect 75 degree world for our little tots. It will help them prepare for the perfect future.
James Duke
Naalehu