LETTERs TO THE EDITOR

There are so many stories about poor, unfortunate government that has badly mismanaged our money. One possible way to help meet these shortfalls might be actually enforcing a couple of simple traffic laws.

When I got my driver's license in 1986, the police were more than happy to give you a ticket for running red lights, speeding and passing on the right. I live in South Elgin with my wife and 1-year-old. I am sick of being passed on the shoulder of Spring Street by impatient, reckless drivers. One day I was passed at this location by an Elgin squad car. On another occasion, my wife was passed by a school bus.

As far as running red lights goes, this seems to be quite a routine practice of the majority of drivers. Red light means two to four more cars make a left. I watched a semi running a red going north on 31 at State in front of that black Dodge Magnum wagon South Elgin police car, and the police did nothing.

Not to pick on South Elgin, these infractions seem to happen everywhere. If I'm up on the current cost of these accident-causing acts, they go for about $100. If the police would do something about it, I'm sure they could raise a lot of money before the public gets put back in line.

I left one out -- tailgating, another huge cause of accidents, unnecessary and occasionally performed by the police. I guess this falls under the category of aggressive driving.

I doubt what I have said will change anything. It will probably take people being killed in accidents or a bunch of lawsuits -- all completely unnecessary.

Dan Simon

South Elgin

Deficits are not good themselves. But they are necessary in government and business to achieve "profits."

When a business buys a big machine, this decision leads to losses/deficits in the first few years: money out to buy the machine, money out to develop the product demand, money out to train the people to operate the machine, etc., all with no money coming in.

These losses/deficits are necessary to create the possibility of future profits from the machine. Despite near-term deficits, decisions to buy machines provide the path to business profitability and growth.

The same applies to the delivery of health care. The U.S.A. spends much, much more of its per-capita annual income (Gross Domestic Product) on the delivery of health care than other advanced countries.

Fixing this problem requires investments in the reform of our health care system in the coming years, and this will create near-term deficits. We should do this, because like the monies used to purchase machines, these investments will yield "profits" in the long term by reducing the overall cost of delivering health care in this country.

This, in turn, will free up monies for businesses to invest in machines, rather than to pay out as premiums to the health insurance companies that currently soak up business capital in our inefficient health care delivery system.

Alfred Y. Kirkland Jr.

Elgin