Mr. Howell thinks that President Bush deserves credit for his handling of Social Security. I think he should have done it completely differently.

The proper and safe way to handle social security would be for the government to mandate a savings plan to be determined by the individual, but not handled by the government. They should require proof at tax time, that an appropriate amount has been placed in the account, and under no conditions should it be possible to use it, anymore than it’s possible to borrow against social security. The past couple of years have proven that stocks are not a safe investment. I don’t know anything about investing, so I don’t know if there is a safe way to invest. Personally, I’d prefer to use a savings account even at the ridiculous interest rates they now pay.

Mr. Howell says that Congress has raided our Social Security funds. That’s true, but, since they are politicians, I prefer the word "stolen". As for leaving an IOU, if anyone read it, it would read, "gotcha again".

He is way off on property taxes. I’m constantly hearing about the terrible prices today, such as property taxes and the price of food, gas, etc. If anyone took a little time to investigate, they would find that most costs are nearly the same as they were 50 or 60 years ago. Since those "great times" when gas was 11-cents a gallon and now, costs have risen approximately 20 to 25 times. When gas was 11-cents, my father made $35 a week. Between 1929 and 1940, he paid off a mortgage and bought two new cars. A comparable job today pays about $800 a week. That would make the price of gas $2.47 which isn’t out of line with the national average. Of course, here in California, we aren’t average. Now, a gallon of premium costs over $3.00. As for the property taxes, he mentions $5000 to $10,000. I remember 50 years ago, we were paying around $1,500 a year. That would equate to nearly $34,000 today. The only reason money seems so short these days is because we have so much more to buy. 60 years ago, we didn’t have TV’s and the average household may have had one or two major appliances. We also had one car to a household instead of one or more for each driver. Also, those cars, if we were lucky, delivered between 10 and 15 miles per gallon. Even SUV’s are better than that.

People who complain about money should do the arithmetic first.

Claude Bedell,

Mission Viejo, CA