Pay labor a fair salary
If you ask enough people in our community if they’re able to sustain their families and make ends meet, you’ll quickly find out that too many of my friends and neighbors aren’t getting a fair shake. Even as the economy has turned around, most Americans haven’t seen any improvement in their pay. It’s just plain wrong that companies pay the people who make our food, care for our loved ones, teach our children and stock the shelves at the stores where we shop so little that they can’t afford the basics. The bottom line is that we all are worth more than CEOs say.
How do we get back on track? It’s vital, but not enough to demand that profitable corporations create jobs that allow our community to thrive. We must continue pressing our elected officials to boost the minimum wage and enact standards that value families. This Labor Day, let’s remember that every person should be able to earn a fair return on the work they do.
Donald Erway
Kailua-Kona
I’m telling you, Ma Earth is hurting
Saying Mother Earth is definitely in trouble is the understatement of the decade, for even a blind person can tell that this fact is true! With planet Earth rapidly heating up, Mother Earth has seen an increase in temperature of 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit in the last century. Global warming claims over 300,000 lives annually and affects another 300 million people adversely healthwise. In addition to that, economic losses due to global warming topples $125 billion dollars every year.
With heat waves, forest fires, floods, tornadoes and hurricanes dominating the world news, it is common sense that even small increases in global warming has terrible consequences on Mother Earth and its inhabitants as seen in the Louisiana floods. “Think globally and act globally” is a more appropriate slogan than “Think globally and act locally.” I’m not saying the latter is unimportant for we have to act locally in addition to acting globally. With the Big Island, many say it is rather appropriate to keep the Big Island just the way it is and even grow more forests.
Global warming can also have an adverse effect on Hawaii’s economy. With rising sea levels and the resulting erosion and the disappearing of Hawaii’s beaches, our oh-so-important tourism industry is in terrible trouble and limbo. Is the end of human civilization near? I wouldn’t doubt so if human beings’ extremely destructive ways of life is allowed to go on much further.
Dean Nagasako
Honokaa