Timesizing® Associates - Homepage

Timesizing News, September 25-30, 2004
[Commentary] ©2004 Phil Hyde, Timesizing.com, Box 622, Porter Sq, Cambridge MA 02140 USA 617-623-8080

9/30/2004   primitive timesizing & worktime consciousness in the news = glimmers of strategic hope - all are 9/29 from GoogleNews & are searched-screened-collected by Alan Applebaum (AA) of Brookline MA with backup from *Ken Ellis (KE) of New Bedford MA (except #15 which is from 9/30 hardcopy, and Australian & Far East stories which are 9/30), and with excerpting and [commenting] by Phil Hyde (PH) unless otherwise initialed -

  1. Job sharing gaining approval in schools - Teachers alternate in a classroom full of students who take the changes in stride
    Press-Enterprise, CA
    by Katie Orloff
    Teachers Cathy Propp and Julie Lloyd share their job. They alternate weeks in the same room, share a desk and teach the same group of children. They each take home half the pay and alternate years on benefits. Their retirement accrual slows to half. [photo caption]
    FONTANA, Calif. - Room 23 at Fontana's Oak Park Elementary school operates on plentiful Post-It notes, letters hand-written on notebook paper and compatibility. It's a part-time deal for its teachers, but its 19 second-graders get a full schedule of schoolroom lessons. Julie Lloyd, a second-grade teacher at Fontanta's Oak Park Elementary school, shares her job with teacher Catherine Propp. But both teachers say they've struck the perfect balance between work and family. They're in their fourth year sharing the job, a move they decided to make after they each had daughters almost five years ago. "I'm so happy with the way it is," Lloyd said. "I wouldn't want to work full time at this point in my life." Each teacher works Thursday and Friday of one week, then Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of the next week. Then they take off a week while the other teaches. They leave letters written on lined notebook paper describing what happened during the week. Propp usually starts hers Monday, and then works on it periodically for three days while she roams the classroom checking students' work. They leave Post-it notes, stuck on a book or stack of papers, with reminders. They keep a discipline chart with students' names, the number of warnings given and a place to write what the problem was. They call each other to discuss more complex issues. When report cards are due, they make a day of it and their daughters play together. They rely on each other's strengths. Lloyd compiles the homework packets. Propp decorates the classroom. Many say compatibility is key to making job-sharing work in a classroom. The two teachers must agree on their approaches to discipline and classroom management. They must be consistent and support each other. "If the two teachers agree philosophically, it can be just a wonderful working relationship that's a benefit to the students and the teachers," said Cindy Andrews, deputy superintendent for the Redlands Unified School District. Most school districts offer teachers the opportunity to job-share. The Corona-Norco Unified School District limits the number of shared contracts it allows at one time to 20 district wide, or 10 each at the elementary and intermediate or high school levels, said Dave LaVelle, deputy superintendent.
    In Menifee, where seven pairs of teachers share jobs, district officials and union representatives worked closely to create a job-sharing program, Assistant Superintendent Linda Callaway said. Teachers who take advantage of the program often want to spend more time with their children while continuing to work, she said by phone. Rules vary from district to district. Most require teachers to pair up on their own and write detailed plans for splitting the work. They require approval by the school principal, the district office and the school board. In San Bernardino, spokeswoman Linda Hill says she sometimes places ads in the district's newsletter for teachers looking for job-share partners. "It gives them the flexibility that in the past wasn't available," said Hill, who job-shared in the district as an elementary teacher in the early '90s. "In many other professions it's more common to have a part-time job." Lloyd's and Propp's students approve of the arrangement. They like both teachers. The switches don't confuse them, though they do sometimes slip and call whichever teacher is on duty by the wrong name. So does their principal, Jinane Annous. She said the two balance each other and they are both family oriented, she said. "I strongly believe that if your family is taken care of, then you can take care of other families," Annous said. "We're in the family business."
    Reach Katie Orloff at (909) 806-3054 or korloff@pe.com

  2. Panel OKs Denver raises - Complex pay-increase proposal now will go before full council
    Denver Post, CO
    By Kris Hudson
    DENVER, Colo. - Denver is poised to begin granting 8,300 of its employees a collective $4.4 million in raises based on job performance. A committee of the City Council opted Tuesday to move ahead with a complicated plan for awarding the raises. The increases, on average, will make up for about half of what employees lost in this year's budget cuts. The plan likely will go to consideration by the full council on Oct. 11. If the council approves the plan, employees will be eligible for the raises after Dec. 1, depending on their job performance. Council members on Tuesday debated how to compensate employees during tight budget years. In the years before Denver voters' approval in 2003 of a personnel-reform issue, Denver employees received automatic annual raises and, if they qualified, merit raises. This year, Mayor John Hickenlooper froze wages and imposed a handful of days off without pay to balance the 2004 budget. [ Timesizing, not downsizing.] For 2005, the $4.4 million raise will amount to 2.25% for each employee who either meets or exceeds expectations for his or her job. Currently, 99% of Denver's non-uniformed employees fit that description. "We can try to do the very best we can, and that's exactly what we want to do," Councilwoman Jeanne Faatz said. "But when (the money) isn't there, it isn't there. We've already stretched ourselves pretty thin." Some employees argue that the council can and should find the money within the budget to grant more significant raises, according to Kelly Brough, director of the city's Career Service Authority. Some employees said as much during a hearing on the matter last week. "They believe it's a policy decision - that you could take money out of something else and put it into their pay," Brough told the council committee. Ultimately, the council committee opted for an intricate proposal calling for "sliding the ranges" and pay "bumps" based on merit. First, the city on Dec. 1 will move each employee down a grade on the city's pay scale but not reduce their pay. Second, once an employee's evaluation date arrives, that employee can be promoted on merit, or "bumped," up to their original grade, which would carry a higher pay level. Such a slide of the pay grades would allow employees at the highest pay grades to receive a raise if they perform well. However, it also would require employees at the lowest pay grade to receive an immediate raise because they cannot be moved down a level. That will cost the city an extra $30,000 to $35,000 in December, according to an estimate from the city's Budget and Management Office.

  3. Korean Air Adds Bali, Phuket Routes
    by Choi Hong-seop (hschoi@chosun.com), Chosun Ilbo, South Korea
    [S.Korea is cutting from a 44- to a 40-hour workweek over the next 7 years. Companies of over 1000 employees cut last July 1 and already there have been benefits for some industries, like airlines -]
    Korean Air has stated that it will reopen its Incheon-Bali route on Oct. 3, which had been cancelled just after the financial crisis back in 1999, and it will also begin operating a newly established Incheon-Phuket route beginning Wednesday, ahead of Korea's honeymoon season. The Incheon-Phuket and Incheon-Bali (Denpasar) routes run twice a week on Wednesday and Sunday, and make use of the 295-seater Airbus A330-300. The shortened work week and the upcoming honeymoon season, which are expected to increase the number of travelers heading to nearby hot spots, prompted Korean Air's decision to add the popular Southeast Asian travel destinations.

  4. GERMANY: Opel again cuts Corsa output
     just-auto.com, United Kingdom
    General Motors' Adam Opel will reduce planned output of Corsa cars at its eastern Germany plant in Eisenach later this year amid slack demand for the model. Reuters said this was the second time this month that Opel has scaled back Corsa production at Eisenach, which makes cars primarily for the sluggish German market. An Opel spokesman reportedly described as "realistic" a story in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper that the 1,800 staff at Eisenach in eastern Germany would work shorter hours for between 6 and 15 days as a result of the measures. Opel had said early this month that it would suspend production of the compact Corsa in Eisenach for 11 days in October amid sluggish demand. Spokesman Frank Klaas told Reuters the Corsa was well received by customers but the problem was a general slowdown in the German car market, Europe's biggest. New car registrations in August hit an eight-year low for that month, and the VDA industry association is counting on a late-year rally just to match 2003 sales of 3.24 million, the news agency noted. "The Corsa is still number two in the overall compact car segment and we are still building more cars than two years ago, but we had to row back a bit because of the market," Klaas told Reuters. Corsa production at Eisenach is now set to hit 140,000 units this year, more than the 127,100 built in 2003 but fewer than the 158,000 Opel had originally envisioned, the report said. Productivity gains have let it increase output while still limiting working time. The Eisenach plant makes Corsas and Astras. The Opel plant in Zaragoza, Spain, also makes Corsas and Corsa vans, Reuters noted. The news agency said reduced Corsa output comes against the backdrop of tense wage negotiations at Opel, where GM's loss-making European arm wants to freeze workers' pay to the end of 2009 and extend the work week without extra compensation.
    [Bingo, a story that dramatizes the problem. Demand is shrinking all over the world because of overconcentrated workhours in the automation age, and what are the Bush-like, ideology-not-reality-based CEOs trying to do? Lengthen the workweek and concentrate the work and wages even further, thus damaging their consumer base more deeply and slitting their own throats.]

  5. Why re-write holidays calendar?
     by Gleb Cherkasov, Gazeta.Ru via MOSNEWS, Russia
    MOSCOW, Russia - Holidays are more than just happy days off work. Holidays reflect national ideology, the public manifestation of a country's fundamental values.
    A multitude of holidays marked in Russia today, including the Soviet-era red-letter days, imperial Russia holidays as well as post-Communist dates, reflect the ideological chaos reigning in the country over the past 15 years.
    Ordinary Russians, however, fully recognize only two holidays - the New Year and the May 9 Victory Day. All other dates colored red in our calendar are never celebrated by a majority of the Russian population. They either believe those 'holidays' to be somewhat controversial or simply see no sense in their having been introduced in the first place. Take for instance, the Independence Day, marked on June 12.
    Sooner or later the government will have to bring order to the national holidays calendar, adjusting it to its own views on what kind of national ideology the country needs. Namely that is why changes to the list of national holidays proposed recently by a group of senior lawmakers seem so interesting.
    Heads of factions in the State Duma, the lower house of Russia's parliament, have proposed the following. From January 1st to the 5th, the country should take a New Year's break. The Dec. 12 Constitution Day and the Nov. 7 Day of Accord and Reconciliation - marked instead of the Soviet-era 1917 Great October Socialist Revolution Anniversary - should be altogether abolished.
    Instead, two new holidays - the Day of National Unity to be marked on 4 November and the Day of Foundation of the State Duma (April 27) - are to be introduced. Apparently, the lawmakers have done their homework well. The first session of the State Duma was held on April 27, 1906. While on Nov. 4, 1612, the early 17th century Times of Trouble ended, according to the authors of the draft bill.
    Let us leave the lawmakers' desire to legitimize the all-Russian New Year drinking-bout aside and not be angry with them about their proposal to have their own birthday celebrated nationwide - - this idea will most likely be rejected as immodest. Both the New Year and the Duma birthday dates have little affect on the creation of a new ideology.
    Yet, as to the idea of marking Nov. 4 - the day the Times of Trouble ended - it gives a clear picture of a country the State Duma members and their patrons in the Kremlin seek to build.
    The Times of Trouble that befell Russia in the early 17th century were, perhaps, the hardest ordeal for the Russian statehood. Russia's sovereignty was at stake and the country's future was vague.
    Only in the Times of Trouble the enemy succeeded in conquering the Russian capital and held control over it for a long time. In the 20th century Nazi Germany failed to achieve the goal. Russia marks its victory over it on 9 May. It is logical that the end of the Times of Trouble, too, deserves to be celebrated.
    By including Nov. 4 in the list of red-letter days our incumbent leaders admit the priority of interests of the state as such over all other interests.
    The initiative to abolish the Constitution Day further confirms that point. The basic law is perceived by our powers-that-be as yet another attribute of state power. So why mark the day of that attribute? The same logic explains the motives of deputies' desire to cross out Nov. 7.
    Whatever it is called, for most Russians this holiday forever remains the Day of the Great October Socialist Revolution, the day when the USSR was actually born. But the country already has a day when the post-Communist Russia was founded - the June 12 Independence Day.
    Besides, would it not be strange to celebrate the anniversary of Bolshevik revolution while at the same time advancing a slogan "State over Everything". Remarkably[?], white emigration writers used to refer to the 1917-1922 period in Russian history as Troubled Times.

  6. Five referendums on tap for Prospect Heights voters
    Chicago Daily Herald, IL
    by Kwame Patterson
    This November, the voters of Prospect Heights will face the largest number of referendums within a single election in the city's 28-year history, according to Illinois State Board of Elections records. A total of five questions from three taxing bodies will be placed on the Nov. 2 ballots. The questions will focus on tax increases, library use, sewer service and future developments within the city. The Old Town Sanitary District was first to put a question on the ballot in June. The district, which covers sewer service in Prospect Heights and parts of Arlington Heights, Wheeling and Mount Prospect, is asking to remain a separate governmental entity, as a hedge against being absorbed by Prospect Heights. According to the 1936 Sanitary District Act, once the last piece of unincorporated district property is swallowed up by a municipality, it must suspend all functions and turn over services to the municipality the majority of its patrons live in. In January, Wheeling annexed the last unincorporated piece of the Old Town District. Now, if voters don't approve of the sewer district remaining separate, Prospect Heights will automatically take over sewer services. City officials say they can do a more efficient job in providing the services than the district, which stands to lose up to $150,000 a year in total tax collections. However, district attorney Paul Sandquist said he believes the current tax collected by the district would increase if the city were to take over. Even though the city has no solid numbers on how much it would charge for sewer services, Mayor Rodney Pace said he guarantees the fee residents currently pay will not increase. In July, the Prospect Heights Public Library board voted to put a referendum on the ballot asking voters to increase the current maximum tax rate by 8 cents per $100 of equalized assessed valuation - from 25 cents to 33 cents. The library's tax portion is now estimated at 3.8% of the total tax bill. Therefore, if a homeowner is paying $2,000 in property taxes, the library's tax rate request would add $1.50 a month or $18 a year to the bill, library officials said. The library board has said it needs more money to maintain current services. It has already cut hours of operation and resources, and if funding isn't raised, library officials may have to cut staff by next spring, according to board President Mary E. Tammen. In another plea for more money, the city council voted in July to request that the sales tax on goods and services and the sales tax on anything that requires a state license be raised from 1% to 1.5%. City Administrator Matt Zimmerman said the increases would not include any new taxes on food and medicine. Pace said the increases would affect residents only when they purchase something within the city limits. The taxes also are paid by nonresidents making purchases in the city. "The (increase) is not solely on the back of Prospect Heights," Pace said. "It's for the people coming into the city." In addition, city officials say that if both increases are approved, the added revenue would generate an estimated $400,000 for the city. There has been no final determination as to what the additional funding would be used for, but Zimmerman said the most pressing issues within the city are roads and storm water management. Furthermore, the city is asking for voters' permission to issue up to $25 million in general obligation alternative bonds to spur developments within its Milwaukee Avenue and Palatine Road Redevelopment Project area. However, some residents believe the bonds will be used toward a proposed arena project that they fear will fail and leave taxpayers to foot the bill. Since 1995, there have been 17 referendums on both the primary and general elections ballots within Prospect Heights, and out of 11 tax increase requests, five of them were rejected.

  7. Working hours plan 'increases pressure'
     [UTV, Ireland]
    European Commission plans to regulate UK working hours may put increased pressure on Northern Ireland's competitiveness, leading business advisors warned today. Northern Ireland company employees work among the longest hours in the UK and moves to introduce a maximum 48 hour week could hit hard, said PricewaterhouseCoopers. But they said the long hours were often a substitute for efficiency and there needed to be greater investment in innovation, technology and quality. They said 65% of employees worked a basic week of over 38 hours but 75% of them routinely worked an additional 8 hours of overtime. Last week the EC allowed the UK to retain its opt-out of the 48 hour maximum week,
    [no teeth]
    but said companies must negotiate opt-outs with unions where collective bargaining agreements covering terms and conditions exist. Paul Terrington, PwC`s HR consulting partner, said local firms were already finding it difficult to remain competitive with the basic working week.
    [Maintaining the domestic consumer base will soon, perforce, take precedence over all this whining about 'remaining competitive.' Competitiveness only concerns the minority of businesses involved in export.]
    He said about 6% of all hourly-paid workers in Northern Ireland regularly worked more than a 48 hour week, so a 48 hour ceiling would be a serious issue for a number of firms.
    [6% does not make it a serious issue for the economy at large.]
    The situation was made worse by the fact that 65% of manufacturing and service companies reported vacancies hard to fill. "More companies are experiencing hard to fill vacancies, most are experiencing spiralling recruitment and training costs and many routinely offer regular and increased overtime to remain competitive," Mr Terrington said.
    [No overtime should be regular or routine.]
    "There is no indication that this situation is improving so further constraints on the length of the working week may directly impact on competitiveness," he added. The PwC Salary Survey also reported that local managers worked even longer hours than hourly paid workers, with only 8% of Northern Ireland managers working their contracted hours and over 30% regularly working the equivalent of a six day week.
    [Well that takes us back to 1900.]
    Mr Terrington said that with nearly 20% of Northern Ireland managers regularly working more than a six day week, it contributed to the UK having the longest working week in Europe.
    [Hey, why not re-institute slavery's 168-hour workweek and completely sink your consumer base?]
    He said since the mid-1990s the Northern Ireland working week had been getting longer. "A small business economy where about 90% of businesses employ fewer than 10 people add to the pressures on management and workers to work longer and harder to remain competitive," he said. But he insisted: "Continually extending the working week for management and workers is unsustainable and the EU has indicated that it strongly disapproves. In many cases these long hours are a substitute for efficiency." And Mr Terrington said if firms were to become internationally competitive within available working hours, "it is vital that Northern Ireland companies increase their commitment to management development and their investment in innovation, technology and quality".

  8. Stress 101: Just take a deep breath
     Minneapolis Star Tribune, MN
    Bill McAuliffe
    By common wisdom, the suburbs are a collection of quiet enclaves, with clean air, chirping birds, smooth, wide streets, cheerful children and content adults, far from the toxins and tensions of the city. But Apple Valley's Keith Carlson has another take on the suburban world. "You look at Cedar Avenue and it's bumper-to-bumper," said Carlson, a full-time school custodian with high blood pressure and two part-time jobs. "And it's supposed to get worse with all the growth. Where I live you can't even have your windows open because of the traffic noise. Little things like that shouldn't bother me, but they do." On Wednesday, Carlson used four hours of his vacation time to join more than 60 other people in a conference room at the Dakota County government center to learn some new wisdom: how to reduce the effects of stress in their lives. The "Relax, Rejuvenate, Restore" workshop, one of a series of five around the metro area, was sponsored by the Greater Twin Cities United Way and the Dakota County Department of Public Health. In a week when the mind-body connection has made the cover of Newsweek magazine, it was only natural that a free session on meditation, biofeedback, Chinese ritual movement and even mindful eating would pop up in Apple Valley. Pat Adams, Dakota County public health director, said the program reflected the recent work of a citizens' health advisory group, which listed improved access to mental health services as one of the top priorities for the department. Penny George, a psychologist who is president of the George Family Foundation, which helped fund the program, said she used stress-reduction as a weapon in her battle against breast cancer. There should be broad public benefit from exploiting the time-honored links between mental and physical health, she added. "One of the reasons we have so much sickness is because of the stress we live with," George said. At the Apple Valley workshop, participants and two presenters ran through the litany of factors that caused stress in their lives: traffic, more demands at work, more hours at work, job loss or reductions, the car radio and the grinding news of war, terrorism and the presidential election. "My husband," one added. The presenters then offered a wide sampling of techniques for blunting stress, including a little bit of breathing and little bit of Buddha. Between short discussions, they turned the lights down and led the group in eyes-closed meditations on images, music and their own heartbeats, as well as drawing exercises and some basic qi gong movements, in which they would"bring a ball of qi [life force] out of the Earth." Mary Pope said she expected to put the new knowledge to use, both at her hectic job in customer service and at home in Randolph, a small community on Dakota County's largely rural southern border. "People are all stretching themselves so thin," Pope said. "We might know a lot of people [in Randolph] but we still have the same stress levels as people in the big cities do. We just have to learn how to handle them." Pope's brush with inner peace ran a little short, though, since she had to leave the workshop before lunch. "I only took the morning off work," she said, dashing for the parking lot.
    Bill McAuliffe is at mcaul@startribune.com

  9. "The People As Enemy: The Leaders' Hidden Agenda in WWII", by John Spritzler
    Axis of Logic, United States
    book review by Beth Henry
    In "The People As Enemy: The Leaders' Hidden Agenda in WWII," John Spritzler unravels the sentimental, patriotic mythology in which the leaders of "winners" of World War II have clothed its barbarous carnage for decades. While political fallout and skirmishes over the Vietnam War remain bitter with the poison of its atrocity and injustice, the invocation of WWII, the "Good War" fought by the "Greatest Generation," almost invariably elicits a misty-eyed gush of patriotism, especially among our elected officials, regardless of ideology or party affiliation. Writing from the point of view of the workers of the countries engaged in WWII, Spritzler reveals not a war fought to defeat dangerous fascist regimes, but a class war on a global scale, waged against workers by the ruling classes of all the antagonists. Spritzler exposes the truth behind the three major points of WWII mythology as told by the ruling class: (1) WWII was a conflict between nations; (2) The Allies' most compelling priority in the war was to defeat the Fascists; and (3) The Allies bombed civilian populations in order to defeat fascism.
    (1) WWII was a conflict between nations.
    The first section of the book is a collection of war-time propaganda posters from various countries, both Axis and Allies. Always, the enemy is an entire nation of people with sinister features and evil intent, and citizens are urged (and frequently forced) to unite under the flag of the homeland to protect their homes, their children, and their lives from these foreign demons. In Japan, the rulers exhorted the people to join in the war effort in mass solidarity ­ "One hundred million hearts beating as one." Other countries, both Axis and Allied, inundated their people with similar messages concerning the threat of an evil foreign power and the need for unity and sacrifice, especially on the part of the workers. A crucial element in pro-war propaganda in both Axis and Allied countries was the portrayal of the citizens of "enemy" nations as being united in their hostility toward one another, thus eliminating any chance of global solidarity among workers.
    (2) The Allies' most compelling priority in the war was to defeat the Fascists.
    Spritzler gives just a few examples ­ France, Italy, Greece, Yugoslavia, the Philippines, and China ­ in which "the Allies treated the anti-Fascist working class Resistance armies as hostile (in many cases attacking them militarily)". And when a pro-fascist coalition led by General Francisco Franco and backed by Hitler and Mussolini staged a revolt against the democratically-elected Spanish government, the U.S., France, and Great Britain refused to aid the republic. President Roosevelt even pushed through legislation that made it illegal to send arms to Spain, receiving for his efforts praise and declarations of gratitude from both Hitler's government and General Franco. If fascism was not the enemy in WWII, then whom were the Allies fighting? As in the title of the book, the true enmity in WWII was not between nations, but between classes. During the years following WWI, a global economic depression began toliterally crush the life out of the working people. Labor movements in countries later to become major players in WWII grew stronger, more militant, and more threatening to the ruling class. Then, as now, it was the owners and shareholders in the major corporations whose money, influence, and interwoven family and business alliances steered the policies of their governments, whether or not those governments claimed to be "of the people". Furthermore, citizens of all the countries involved in WWI were still haunted, angry, and distrustful of their governments in the wake of the senseless atrocities and irrevocable losses they had suffered in that conflict. Spritzler describes not only the radicalization of the work force and the masses in the U.S., with which many of us are somewhat familiar, but also the workers' revolts in Japan and Germany. He presents evidence that would surprise many in this country who assume that the Germans and Japanese were, for the most part, loyal to the Nazi Party and the Emperor, respectively. In Germany, for instance, the Nazi Party was never actually voted into power, and workers' and citizens' revolts against it and its policies had to be crushed by force even throughout WWII. The Japanese people were rising up all over their country with furious demands for the rights of workers and protests against their empire's wars and invasions, much to the alarm of their ruling class. Workers in Europe and the UK were similarly militant and threatening to the interests and fortunes, even the survival, of the existing ruling class. Heads of state all over the world were wringing their hands over the problem of unions, socialist movements, strikes, and even potential revolution. They knew that only a global military conflict would halt the momentum of the people toward the kind of just and humane society that would deprive them of their wealth, status, and hegemony. War would unite workers in nationalist, rather than populist, solidarity, in which workers of one nation would be pitted against those of another. This false and insular solidarity in enmity could then be used to quell dissent and promote militant patriotism. Best of all, that patriotism and the fear of foreign incursions could be used to compel workers to put in more hours and produce more for less pay.
    [Then it backfired, because it created a labor shortage that engaged market forces in increasing labor's power and giving them fewer hours and more pay.]
    They had found a way not only to put a damper on the workers' revolts, but to coerce them to withdraw their demands and submit to adverse conditions voluntarily. WWII, then, was not fought to end fascism. It was a war prosecuted by wealthy oligarchs worldwide against the workers upon whom they relied for their continued existence.
    [This doesn't make sense.]
    And it was fought by the workers themselves, whose labors also furnished the weapons used against them.
    (3) The Allies bombed civilian populations in order to defeat fascism.
    In the histories, novels, and movies about WWII, the Nazi bombardment of Great Britain demonstrates for the reader or viewer the mercilessness of the Nazis and the courage of the British people. Many inspiring tales of bravery, romance, and sacrifice during the war derive from the Blitzkrieg and the British response to it. Few on the "winning" side know that in one Allied mission alone, the British Operation Gomorrah, 45,000 people in Hamburg, Germany were killed in a massive firestorm. On July27-28, 1943, 278 bombers attacked the city with incendiary bombs, incinerating more German civilians in one night than thetotal number of British civilians killed over the duration of the Blitz. By May, 1945, Operation Gomorrah and similar Allied attacks on Dresden and Berlin had resulted in the deaths of at least 300,000 German civilians. The U.S. used the same strategy against Japan in March of that same year, dropping 1,165 tons of incendiary bombs on the densely populated city of Tokyo and killing more than 87,000 Japanese civilians. That same holocaust from the air was also visited upon Nagoya, Osaka, Kobe, and Yokohama. Of course, the most hideous and obscene slaughter occurred in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August, 1945, when the U.S. became the first, and so far, the only country, to attack civilian populations with atomic bombs. These attacks, supposedly carried out to end the war, killed 210,000 civilians outright, with another 130,000 dying over the next five years from radiation poisoning. How can such barbarous, wanton slaughter, and on such a monstrous scale, be justified, morally or even strategically? We are repeatedly told, and told again on the anniversary of the holocausts of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, that those and other attacks on civilian populations in Axis nations were a last-ditch effort to bring the enemies to surrender. That their citizens, loyal as they were to their fascist governments, had to be demoralized, along with their leaders, into submission. We are told, even down to specific numbers, how many Allied lives were saved by the mass incineration of Axis civilians. Spritzler maintains, with convincing evidence, that the Allies targeted the largely anti-fascist populations of the Axis countries because of their resistance, both before and during the war, to the fascist principle of the melding of state and corporate power. This explanation makes much more sense, when viewed in the context of Spritzler's documentation of workers' movements in Germany, Japan, and Italy, than the mythical rationale of regrettable, but strategically critical, mass murder. Spritzler further exposes the Allied excuse for the convoluted lie that it was by showing that the most reliable intelligence, as well as the consensus of the military's highest-ranking officers, had concluded before the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki that the Japanese were as good as beaten.
    Conclusion
    The People As Enemy makes the case that WWII was fought by the workers, against themselves, and for the ruling classes of the belligerent nations. German and Japanese business leaders, although they bore with their nationsthe ignominy of defeat, actually suffered little, and gained much as a result. WWII effectively suppressed the burgeoning workers' movements countries on both sides, while even further enriching the "captains of industry" whose corporations furnished the weapons and other materials for its prosecution. In his conclusion, Spritzler admits that "Some readers may find the account of World War Two presented here to be emotionally depressing because it undermines the hope that we can make a better world." For those readers, he points out the truly hopeful and positive aspect of the whole catastrophe. There is a memory of solidarity, or perception and celebration of solidarity, of people of all backgrounds, races and social classes, selflessly and courageously acting together to defeat the anti-democratic, anti-human ideology and rule of fascism. If people have united in such a struggle before, it stands to reason that they can, and will, again. If they can be organized in that struggle against the true fascists, they can prevail. The leaders of our increasingly blatantly fascist government in the U.S. know this. Of all the groups united against government policies, and for the people, a mass movement of the workers is what they most fear. Having read this book, it is obvious that the ruling class in this country realizes that there are more of us than there are of them. They know that they only nominally, and by the acquiescence of the workers, and by means of coercion and intimidation, if necessary, control nation's production, economy, government, and society. They know that if the workers in this nation truly unite and demand an equitable and humane distribution of labor and reward, they face certain defeat. That is both cause for hope, and fuel for the struggle.
    John Spritzler holds a Doctor of Science degree (in biostatistics) from the Harvard School of Public Health where he is employed as a Research Scientist engaged in AIDS clinical trials. The People As Enemy: The Leaders' Hidden Agenda in WWII, is published by Black Rose Books.

  10. WSU, USU Concerned About Declines in Enrollment
    AP via KSL-TV, UT
    OGDEN, Utah - Weber State and Utah State are concerned about declines in undergraduate enrollment this year, with WSU officials say it will mean some budget cuts. USU's total enrollment is up 585 to 23,601 but that is due to increases in continuing education and doctoral student enrollment, and its freshman-through-senior student population is down. Weber State enrollment for fall 2004 is 18,498, down 323 students from last year. "A decrease of 323 students is certainly something we're concerned about, but not panicked over," said Bruce Bowen, WSU associate provost for enrollment services. Utah State has an enrollment of 23,601 for fall 2004, up 585 from 2003's count of 23,016. Weber officials said adjustments will be needed to ensure the school stays within budget. "It's too early to tell where we would make the reduction, but there will be some cuts," said Norm Tarbox, Weber State vice president of administrative services. WSU President Ann Millner said it will be about a month before university officials will be able to evaluate any budget cuts. Weber State officials say an upswing in the economy may be sending more students to work rather than to school. Students are also taking fewer credits, presumably in order to work more hours. "It's a telltale sign the economy is picking up," Tarbox said. "It's a natural pattern when the economy rebounds."
    [Don't bet on it. It could also be just a telltale sign and natural pattern when students are getting more desperate for money.]
    Utah State officials say they aren't attracting as many incoming freshmen as they used to. The university has been told that statewide data show a decrease in the number of high school graduates in 2004 and 2005, said Utah State spokesman John DeVilbiss. "It's expected to go back up in 2006," DeVilbiss said. Further, recent state legislation that raises the cost of out-of-state tuition has reduced the number of Utah State students coming from Idaho and Wyoming, DeVilbiss said. DeVilbiss said the upswing in enrollment at Utah State's continuing education sites - mainly in Roosevelt/Vernal, Brigham City, Tooele and Moab - could be a reflection of a still-lagging economy. "People go back to school because they want a job change and need new skills, or because they have been laid off," DeVilbiss said. Utah State will work on recruiting freshmen and lobbying the Legislature to change out-of-state tuition legislation, he said.

  11. A Longer Arm - Police asked to comment on redistribution say big beats stretch officers way too thin
     Winston-Salem Journal, United States
    by Patrick Wilson
    WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. - A few months ago, the top brass at the Winston-Salem Police Department asked patrol officers for their candid concerns about the department's new beat and scheduling system. They got what they asked for. In e-mail after e-mail, the officers and their supervisors said that the system - in place for about 15 months - was in need of an overhaul. Under the plan, the city has three patrol districts instead of the four that it had used for years. Officers complain that the larger beats in those districts mean that they spend too much time driving and less time getting to know the community. "Most officers are indicating that because of the size of the beats, backup, when assigned or requested, takes a long time to arrive, which is a safety concern," Sgt. Howard Brown wrote in comments echoed by dozens of other sergeants, lieutenants and officers. "The beats need to be resized so they are smaller." The documents were released after the Winston-Salem Journal made a request under North Carolina's public-records law. In releasing the records, Chief Pat Norris said that the e-mails show that she is serious about discussing things with patrol officers. "I believe that for an organization to be successful, constructive feedback must be sought and appropriately considered to improve operations." She and other top police officials say that the redeployment is working. The city's crime rate is down this year, and officers are still meeting their goals for responding to 911 calls in time.
    Making adjustments
    The department is still adjusting to the restructuring, which started in July 2003. There used to be four sectors, each with eight beats. Now there are three districts, each with five beats. Winston-Salem is about 110 square miles. Some foot patrols were eliminated, and the three shifts of officers were stretched into five overlapping shifts. The moves were designed to put more officers on duty, especially between 9 p.m. and 1 a.m., when the demand for police service is highest. Norris and her team said they are using the comments from patrol officers and will consider changes in the beat system. Police supervisors have said that the redeployment was the biggest change ever made in the culture of the department. Officers have been grumbling quietly about the new beats and schedules since they were put in place. The department asked lieutenants to take a more formal approach for getting opinions, and they talked with sergeants and patrol officers. Their comments were sent to Assistant Chief Ronnie Abernathy, who oversees patrol officers. Norris, who moved into the chief's job from assistant chief in March, said that officers are still trying to get accustomed to the different structure. "People are a little resistant to change, and there are some logistic things that we looked at," she said. "We wanted to work it for a year to see what those logistics were, and we're addressing those." In addition to the size of their beats, officers said, they were concerned that they were getting sent outside their beats too often, and that they were being assigned calls that are civil matters and shouldn't be handled by police. Many officers offered suggestions for improvement. The consistent complaint was that beats are too big and manpower is too weak because officers are stretched across five shifts. "All beat officers concur that the beats are too large (District too big) to effectively work," Lt. Brad Yandell wrote, referring to opinions from officers in District 2, which includes most of the east side of the city. Most officers in the other two districts also said that beats were too large. "Everyone is basically in agreement that the beats and districts are too big," Lt. David Perry wrote. "Many of our officers are having to drive considerable distances to cover their beats. This is one area that needs to be thoroughly evaluated," Lt. Bryan Macy wrote in his report. "The common denominator is that the beats are too large and we are short on manpower," Lt. Mitch Masencup wrote. "We are call-response driven and will be until some adjustments are made with the manpower and beat issues."
    View from the top
    The city hired consultant Peter Bellmio of Maryland to help the department change its system. He has done similar work for such cities as Knox-ville, Tenn., and Los Angeles. The new beat lines were drawn based on workload, designed so that each beat required a similar amount of work. Officers' shifts were expanded from nine hours and 30 minutes to 10 hours. Most patrol officers work five days on and then have four days off. Despite the concerns of officers, police leaders say that the redeployment has had good results. Crime has gone down since the new system began, a civilian unit has been handling many calls over the telephone that used to be assigned to officers, and police overtime costs are down. The city spent $652,198 on police overtime in 2002-03, the last year of the old system, and about $335,000 in 2003-04. Police administrators said that there have been times when workload went up and the number of officers was down because of sick time, vacation time and attrition. But Abernathy said that the department currently has 234 patrol officers - not including recruits in training - close to the 243 patrol positions in the budget. The number is up from 202 officers in August 2003, he said.
    Sticking with it
    Before the redeployment, there were not enough officers on duty to handle the workload on evenings and weekends, he said. Now officers handle most calls within their beats, he said. The department's goal for responding to emergencies is six minutes, and the average response has been 5:35, Abernathy said. The response goal for nonemergency calls is 15 minutes, and the average response takes 14:03. The department is considering changing beat lines when it incorporates new areas that the city will add through annexation. The city's planned annexation is not likely to begin until 2006. "Today, we are not changing beat configurations," Abernathy said. "Deployment is a process, though, and we are constantly looking at that."
    Patrick Wilson can be reached at 727-7286 or at pwilson@wsjournal.com

  12. Hertzberg joins criticism - Hopeful challenges Hahn on rising crime Los Angeles Daily News, CA
    By Rick Orlov
    Joining the criticism of Mayor James Hahn, former Assembly Speaker Bob Hertzberg on Tuesday challenged the mayor's effort to make Los Angeles the nation's safest big city. In a posting on his campaign Web site, www.changela.com , Hertzberg said he wants to "cut through the generalizations and see what crime looks like in our neighborhoods." Hertzberg is one of four major opponents to Hahn in the March 8 election. "There's been a lot of talk about crime and gangs lately," Hertzberg said, citing the Daily News series "Terror in our streets" that is being published this week. "We've heard that gang crimes are up, we've heard Chief (William) Bratton announce that LAPD won't meet its goal of cutting the murder rate by 20%." The Web page links to a map of the Los Angeles Police Department's 18 divisions and draws a comparison of the most recent crime figures and those of 2001, when Hahn took office. The results show an increase in overall crime in five of the divisions and dramatic increases in gang-related slayings - 20.8% - along with hikes in attempted murders, extortions and carjackings. Hertzberg acknowledged that crime citywide is down 4% from when Hahn took office, but he said Los Angeles remains a dangerous city. "There were more murders in the San Fernando Valley in 2003 than in the entire city of San Diego," Hertzberg said. "The murder rate in the West L.A. bureau is almost twice as high as San Jose's. "So crime is down citywide, but what that actually means depends on where you live and how you define 'safe.' "Are we safer than we were three years ago?" Deputy Mayor Julie Wong, however, contested the figures posted by Hertzberg. "They don't match the figures we've been given," she said. "Also, we think it's unfair to compare with the time from before Chief Bratton was brought on board. The fact is, crime is down in all areas." Hertzberg aides, however, defended their figures, saying they came directly from the LAPD. The Hertzberg attack comes after nearly three weeks of criticism of the mayor's record on crime by Councilman Bernard Parks, who also is challenging Hahn's re-election. Parks, forced out as police chief by Hahn, has complained about the rising level of homicides in his South Los Angeles district and linked it to the compressed work schedule Hahn approved for police officers. The councilman has vowed to return to the LAPD to a standard five-day, 40-hour work week for officers, who now work three-day, 12-hour shifts or other flexible schedules. "My first act (as mayor) will be to make sure police are fighting crime on a full-time basis," Parks said in a statement Tuesday.
    [So, another regressive relengthening of the workweek, this time from 36 to 40 hours, though we can't say we like the idea of 12-hour shifts. The last few hours of a 12-hour shift are just too inefficient and error-prone, and the whole thing is liable to be less prioritized than shorter shifts.]
    Hahn said the compressed work schedule gives police more flexibility in assigning officers and has served to improve morale. Also, officers say they work the same number of hours under the compressed work plan as under a traditional schedule.
    [Oh yeah? 3x12 came to 36, not 40, in our math book.]
    Rick Orlov, (213) 978-0390 rick.orlov@dailynews.com

  13. Met celebrates 175 years on the beat BBC News, UK
    Commissioner Sir John Stevens with an officer in the 1829 uniform With only a truncheon and a rattle for protection, the first Metropolitan Police constables took to London's streets 175 years ago on Tuesday 29 September 1829. Named after Home Secretary Robert Peel, the original "Peelers" - later Bobbies - based at 4 Whitehall Place had a tough job. For three shillings a day, new constables could expect 12-hour night shifts and no days off. They faced a hostile press and public - some reports say the first traffic police risked being run down and horse-whipped by irate coachmen. High-necked tunics protected officers from strangulation and top hats were reinforced as Peelers were likely to be attacked in the street - and penalties for violent crime were more lenient. After Pc Robert Culley was stabbed to death at a riot in Holborn in 1833 a coroner's jury returned a verdict of "justifiable homicide".
    'Working class traitors'
    But still the new force managed to recruit about 1,000 constables who had to be "of good character", able to read and write and be physically fit. "They were known as working class traitors, the working classes thought they would be sneering at them and the upper classes and businessmen didn't want them poking their noses in," said Met officer Maggie Bird, who works in the force's archives office. "There were committees set up to disband the new police and there were riots in the streets."
    It was a tough life, but a steady job: Maggie Bird, Met archives
    "But I suppose it was a steady job, if you kept your nose clean, you got a regular wage, a uniform, accommodation[?!] at police stations - it was a tough life, but a steady job." Few recruits came from London. As agriculture declined, people flocked from the countryside, particularly East Anglia and the West Country, to join the Met.
    Reinforced top hats
    But many wanted to keep local control of law and order and felt the old system worked better. "The people who set the Met up were very careful to pronounce that before they arrived there was terror, chaos and death on the streets of London, " said Dr Chris Williams, a history lecturer at the Open University. "But there has been lots of research and the persistent answer is that is not the case." "[Policing] was patchy and locally controlled - the Met was about centralising, a 'one size fits all' force across London. In some places it [policing] got better, in some places it got worse."
    Since 1829 one of the things police have done is fill in forms, and they've always complained about it: Dr Chris Williams, Open University
    But despite the initial hostility, the Met was there to stay. By the 1840s the old detective-style units formerly run by magistrates, the most famous of which was the Bow Street Runners, had been absorbed, as had the marine unit, although the City of London retains its own police force today. By 1890 there was a police pension and within the next forty years the force would start to incorporate radios, patrol cars, early versions of 999 and women officers. The first 1,000 Peelers covered a seven-mile circle around Charing Cross and a population of less than 2m and their duties were largely limited to patrols. Today the Met has 30,000 officers, covers 620 square miles and 7.2m people and handles everything from traffic offences to international terrorism. But some things, apparently, do not change. "Since 1829 one of the things police have done is fill in forms - and they have always complained about it as well," said Dr Williams. "The unique selling point of the Met was its bureaucracy, there were some efficient parish-based watches [beforehand], what the Met did was process information."

  14. Chicago unveils Haymarket Monument - 118 years later
     Workday Minnesota, MN
    By Jeff Weiss, The Federation News
    CHICAGO, Ill. - It took 118 years, but Chicago has a monument to the eight workers unjustly condemned to die after the famous 1886 Haymarket Square "riot." In a ceremony keynoted by Mayor Richard M. Daley and union leaders, the monument was unveiled Sept. 14 at Randolph Street and Desplaines Avenue, near the site of the May 4, 1886, tragedy. The monument is a 15-foot speakers' wagon sculpture, commemorating the wagon on which the labor leaders stood that evening to champion the 8-hour day. It symbolizes the assembly at Haymarket, and is centerpiece of a new Labor Park there. Mary Brogger's sculpture accompanies an International Commemoration Wall, sidewalk plaques, a cultural pylon, seating area and banners. An oversized statue of a policeman was transferred from the square to the city police academy in 1972. "Hopefully because of our collaborative efforts, we will honor the famous last words of Haymarket martyr August Spies who stated: 'There will come a time when our silence will be more powerful than the voices you strangle today,'" Chicago Federation of Labor President Dennis Gannon said before the ceremony. "I believe that time has come this year and that we will never forget the significance of this labor site or the workers who paid the ultimate price for our freedom," he added. The Haymarket Monument honors the workers who led the agitation for an 8-hour day, an unheard-of concept in 1886, when 10- and 12-hour days were common, according to the Illinois Labor History Society. It also honors the travail they endured. The workers were speaking peaceably to a crowd in Haymarket Square, when 175 police - led by a notoriously anti-worker officer - appeared and ordered the workers to disperse. The Haymarket Square meeting was called after two protesters for the 8-hour day were gunned down at the McCormick Reaper works the day before. Mayor Carter H. Harrison, who was also at Haymarket, went to the nearby police station beforehand and reported that all was peaceful, and the crowd had started to drift away. But the police disregarded the mayor and appeared in force. Then an unknown person threw a dynamite bomb. "Seven policemen and four in the crowd died from the explosion and the outburst of pistol fire from the police which followed," the Labor History Society adds. "This set of events was dubbed the 'Haymarket Riot,' with its connotation of an unruly and riotous crowd to be quelled by officers of the law. The tragic error, it seems clear, lies at the feet of the police commander who failed to respect the First Amendment and its guarantee of the right to assemble and give voice to grievances." After the "riot," the union leaders - most of them labeled "anarchists" - were arrested, tried and condemned to death in a prosecution widely denounced as a travesty and extensively prejudiced by anti-worker newspaper publicity. "In the public mind, the notion of 'labor movement bomb thrower' became associated with the entire 8-hour day movement," the society adds. "It was not until 1938 that Congress passed the Fair Labor Standards Act which established the 40-hour work week. Thus, the 8-hour day became the national norm." Several of the unionists died on the scaffold after their convictions. One committed suicide. The three still alive then were pardoned in 1893 by Gov. John Peter Altgeld, who blasted the trial as completely unjust.

  15. Warning on spread of sex trade, Reuters via NYT, A15.
    Slavery is booming in South Asia, with hundreds of thousands of women and children being sold or forced into the sex trade or domestic service each year, UNICEF warned. Wars in Afghanistan and Nepal are worsening matters by displacing thousands of young people, who go in search of safety and work only to be lured or pushed into the sex trade. ...Dr. Sahig Rasheed, regional director for South Asia, said at a conference in Sri Lanka [that] about 500,000 women and children are being trafficked each year in Asia....
    [Slavery is the extreme of unregulated worktime. Unless we get into full employment automatically maintained by worksharing along Timesizing lines, this Third World pandemic is the future of virtually all our offsping, because "the more $concentration, the less $circulation," and though we're getting hundreds of new billionaires and thousands of new millionaires, we're getting millions of new poverty cases every year in the decreasingly stable USA.]
9/29/2004   primitive timesizing & worktime consciousness in the news = glimmers of strategic hope - all are 9/28 from GoogleNews & are searched-screened-collected by Alan Applebaum (AA) of Brookline MA with backup from *Ken Ellis (KE) of New Bedford MA (except #18 which is from 9/29 hardcopy, and Australian & Far East stories which are 9/29), and with excerpting and [commenting] by Phil Hyde (PH) unless otherwise initialed -

  1. Off the dole - And on the assembly line
     by William Boston, Businessweek [US]
    LEIPZIG, Germany - Heike Müller...a mechanic, embodies what seems to be going right in eastern Germany. After the Berlin Wall fell in 1989 and Germany was unified a year later, Müller lost her job at a chemical company. Since then, she has gotten by with make-work schemes and retraining programs. Then, in 2001, BMW decided to build a manufacturing plant in Leipzig, and Müller's life changed. She completed an orientation program, then began commuting to Munich to train at BMW's plant there for the 2005 opening of the Leipzig factory. The new plant will manufacture BMW's 3-Series limousines. "Now I am the head of the windshield mounting unit," she says with pride. "I was really fed up with being unemployed."
    Müller's story shows what can be accomplished when companies work with the government and unions to turn things around. BMW had some enticing incentives to locate its plant in Leipzig. The European Commission classifies the city as a structurally weak region, which allows the local government to subsidize as much as 30.1% of corporate investment once the plant is completed. BMW plans to invest up to $1.59 billion in the new auto plant, but final costs could be higher. That means the Munich auto maker could end up getting a payment of as much as $500 million from the government of Saxony.
    [So bottom line: this is still makework, and Heike Mueller is still "getting by with make-work schemes." At least there are some futuristic timesizing aspects to BMW's way of operating, at least in this particular plant -]
    ...BMW had considered building the plant in the neighboring Czech Republic. But Leipzig went to great lengths to persuade the company to locate there. Obtaining the permits needed to begin construction of the plant took just eight weeks, compared with more than a year in western Germany. The IG Metall union agreed to a number of BMW demands to let the company run machines longer in peak production phases [ie: add hours, like Nucor and Lincoln Electric, and...] and cut hours when demand is low [instead of doing layoffs] - without requiring management to give advance notice, as is typical in west German factories. "We can run our machines between 60 and 140 hours with great flexibility. That would have been impossible in the Czech Republic," says Reichenauer. "German wage costs are higher, but unit wages aren't everything."
    Of course, BMW alone can't solve Leipzig's joblessness. Its unemployment rate is 18.8%, with 75,000 individuals looking for a job. Reichenauer says BMW has received 110,000 applications from all over Germany for the 5,500 jobs at the plant. But if more companies copy BMW's blueprint, they could well find the workers they need.
    [In a depression-level labor surplus? That's hardly the problem. The sentence we're expecting here is: "But if more companies copy BMW's blueprint, they could make a serious dent in Leipzig's unemployment problem." And of that, there's not a chance - here's what we cut from above -]
    So far, nearly 500 jobless have been hired..\..
    [That's 500 out of 75,000 unemployed in ONE CITY ALONE. And the state of Saxony is paying up to $500 MILLION for a measly 500 jobs??? This makework approach is just plain insane. It amounts to merely more charity for the rich, in this case the wealthy top executives of BMW. That means more concentration of the national income at the top where it's wasted for vital employment and consumption purposes because "the more concentration, the less circulation." Germany needs thorough-going automatic worksharing along Timesizing lines immediately. Clearly politicians and economists even in haphazardly worksharing Germany are in denial about the timesizing imperative of the technological age.]
    Another attraction is Leipzig's location in the middle of east Germany's auto belt, which will allow BMW to benefit from a concentration of skilled labor and suppliers.
    When BMW began investing in Leipzig in 2002, few of its new hires came from the ranks of the unemployed. Most were skilled workers hired from small and medium-size companies in the region. But because there were so many jobless workers in Leipzig, city officials and BMW executives sat down and came up with a plan, which they dubbed "Pole Position," because the program aimed to improve qualifications for the jobless, putting them in a better position to compete with employed applicants for jobs at the plant.
    [Still doesn't explain "Pole Position," especially so close to Poland.]
    "In the beginning our management was very skeptical," says Rudolf Reichenauer, personnel chief for BMW's Leipzig plant. "But we were pleasantly surprised." Reichenauer says those hired from the jobless ranks often were highly motivated, flexible, and able to take on responsibility.
    Working with a city-owned employment agency called Pool, BMW started sifting through lists of jobless workers in Leipzig and the surrounding region. It asked those with the best skills and most motivation to take a written test. Those who passed, such as Müller, were invited to participate in a training program that requires commuting to a BMW plant in Regensburg, in northern Bavaria, for six weeks.
    After that, the best performers are trained for their work in Leipzig at a BMW plant in Munich. BMW says someone in Müller's position working at the Leipzig plant will earn between $30,522 and $36,629, about 85% of the salary for the same job at BMW's Munich plant. The company aims to find 10% of its new hires among the ranks of the unemployed. So far, nearly 500 jobless have been hired....
    [Politically manufactured, i.e., discretionary makework cannot handle unemployment on this scale. It can only be handled by our usual stupid "solution" of major workforce kill-off in large-scale war, or the real long-term solution, a smarter application of automatic (not discretionary) worksharing along Timesizing lines.]

  2. Salvation Army's troubles not over - Help has come to Salvation Army, but not enough
     by Eric Moskowitz, Concord Monitor, NH
    CONCORD, N.H. - A recent influx of donations enabled the Salvation Army of Concord to bring back its laid-off employees sooner than expected. The agency implemented a mandatory two-week layoff [ie: furlough] for all eight employees after Labor Day, but new donations helped the Salvation Army restore its work force after just a week, the director of the agency's homeless shelter said.
    But that reprieve doesn't solve a bigger problem looming ahead, said Michelle French-Labrecque, who runs the McKenna House shelter.
    "We're trying to look at innovative ways to come up with some extra operating money so this doesn't have to happen again," French-Labrecque said. "We don't want to close the shelter, but if we can't come up with the money that's needed, you never know. We may have to look at cutting hours or closing the shelter in the summer and opening it in the winter, when it's the coldest."
    The Salvation Army is in a difficult position, she said. On one hand, the flood of donations in the first week alone after the layoffs (about $12,000, French-Labrecque said) was tremendously heartening. "It was great," she said, thanking everyone who gave money, goods and services or called to offer help. "The community was very supportive."
    But the influx doesn't address the larger problem, that the local corps may not regularly be able to meet expenses without major changes.
    The local Salvation Army runs on an annual operating budget of roughly $800,000. The biggest chunk, about $250,000, covers operating expenses for the 28-bed homeless shelter, which provides food, clothing, toiletries, case-management services and a place to sleep for more than 300 people a year, French-Labrecque said. The average stay is about five months, and the shelter is always full, she said. To run the shelter, the agency gets $32,000 from the city and $50,000 from the state. All other expenses are covered by thrift-store sales and donations; the national Salvation Army does not provide financial assistance.
    A variety of factors, including the rising costs of employee health insurance and corporate policies that restrict storefront solicitations, have contributed to the agency'spredicament. Over the summer, Capt. Bob Kountz realized that expenses were outpacing revenues and was forced to lay off [ie: furlough] all eight employees for two weeks, saving a fraction of their total $150,000 in annual salary and benefits. The eight included Kountz and his wife, Capt. Wendy Kountz, who worked without pay during the period, trying to maintain all services with a crew of volunteers.
    Coming to the aid of the Salvation Army, the Friends Program - a United Way-affiliated social service organization based in Concord -offered $10 an hour to cover the bulk of French-Labrecque's salary from Sept. 13 through the end of the month. The program will also advise a task force aimed at finding a permanent solution, French-Labrecque said.
    "We're very small," said Anne Omundson, Friends Program office manager. "But we wanted to show that we can all pitch in together to meet the needs of the people, because that's what it's all about."
    Donations have helped the Salvation Army meet payroll again, but the McKenna House is threatened by a need to raise an additional $20,000 a year, starting this year, to replace a trust fund that has run out, French-Labrecque said. To save money, McKenna House has not filled its second staff position since February, meaning French-Labrecque is the only Salvation Army employee assigned to the shelter. To keep the shelter supervised and operating 24 hours a day, French-Labrecque relies on a team of seven volunteers.
    "You can only cut back so much. We're at the bare bones of necessity. You can't expect (shelter) residents to go without toilet paper. . . . So consequently, I'm without a staff person, and it's very trying. And it's very difficult - it's putting a lot of stress on volunteers."
    (Eric Moskowitz can be reached at 224-5301, ext. 310, or by e-mail at emoskowitz@cmonitor.com

  3. PHA to lay off 10 employees - Other workers must take days off without pay because of deficit
     By CLARE JELLICK
    Peoria Journal Star, IL
    PEORIA, Ill. - Some Peoria Housing Authority employees will lose their jobs whileothers will take unpaid days off to cover a projected shortfall in the agency's 2005 operating budget. On Monday, the agency's commissioners approved laying off 10 of its 88 employees and making its staff take 20 unpaid days off. Officials said these cuts are necessary to cover what would have been a $1 million deficit in the agency's operating budget. The agengy's overall budget is about $3.9 million. "It's the best choice at this point in time," PHA commissioner Duane Heward said after the meeting. "We have to be prudent for the benefit of our residents and our staff. " With the cuts factored in, the agency's deficit is about $408,000. The layoffs will save about $444,000, and the days off will save about $194,000. The deficit is only an estimate because the agency hasn't found out how much money it's getting from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. PHA spokeswoman Shari Henry said if HUD gives the agency more money than expected or if the agency finds ways to save money, the layoffs and furloughs could change. Budgets must be submitted to HUD by Oct. 1, but the agency won't know how much money it'll get until early next year. "The whole hope is that the housing authority doesn't have to lay off employees or have furlough days, but we have to prepare for the worst-case scenario and all is contingent on HUD funding," Henry said. Long-term vacancies at Harrison Homes continue to be the main reason the PHA will be getting less money than it needs, officials said. HUD won't fully fund a housing authority's vacant units, which means about 170 empty Harrison apartments will cost the PHA a little more than $500,000. Many of the Harrison units, built in the 1940s and 1950s, have remained vacant because of deteriorating conditions. "We're funneling such a large portion of our budget into maintaining that site," John said during the meeting. The PHA plans to demolish about 270 units there as soon as possible. About 150 units north of Krause Avenue should be demolished next year, but the timeline for about 120 units south of Krause is uncertain, Henry said. Some of the layoffs are contingent on the demolitions. Henry said an increase in the cost of workman's compensation and health insurance also contributed to the agency's deficit. The agency expects workman's compensation to increase by 3% next year and insurance premiums to increase by 15%. Employee furloughs aren't new to the housing authority. In 2003, the agency asked all employees to take off 20 days. This year, trade union employees and clerical staff were asked to take off six weeks, Henry said.

  4. Debate offers divergent views of tax cap
     Brunswick Times Record, ME
    Elizabeth_Dorsey@TimesRecord.Com
    BRUNSWICK, Me. - If a debate sponsored by the League of Women Voters on Monday is any indication, property tax cap supporters and property tax cap opponents have very different concepts of what constitutes fair taxation. To Frank Wibby, a representative of the pro-tax cap group Tax Cap Now, fairness means that everyone pays the same amount for the services he or she uses and that no one works his or her whole life only to face the threat of being taxed out of a home. "If we all get the same services, then we should all pay the same for them. That's fair," said Wibby, a retired high school teacher from Yarmouth. But to Christopher St. John, executive director of the Maine Center for Economic Policy, fair tax relief means targeting those who need it the most. It does not mean applying a one-size-fits-all tax cap to every Maine community. Nor does it mean requiring citizens to pay user fees for such traditionally taxpayer-supported institutions as schools and libraries, a possible outcome if the tax cap is implemented, according to some town officials. The statewide property tax cap referendum to appear as Question 1 on the Nov. 2 ballot asks Maine voters if they would support limiting property taxes to 1% of the assessed value of property. In Brunswick, Town Manager Donald Gerrish has said the town would lose an estimated $9.6 million a year in property tax revenue and might have to cut more than 100 jobs if the initiative passes. Monday's debate between St. John and Wibby, attended by about 30 people, took place at Curtis Memorial Library, which stands to lose about $550,000 a year in operating revenue - one-half the library's annual budget - if the property tax cap passes, according to estimates by the town manager's office. A recent letter from Michael Jones of Curtis Memorial's board of directors states that the library would be forced to reduce hours from 62 per week to 35 per week and, for the first time in its 100-year history, charge user fees if the revenue it receives from municipal sources is halved as a result of passage of the tax cap. Tax cap supporters, however, have called these projections scare tactics and have accused the town of not looking hard enough for efficiencies and ways to reduce municipal spending. But, says St. John, it will take far more than budgetary efficiencies to make up the 30% to 50% loss in revenue that service center communities such as Brunswick will face. Complicating the problem for service centers and urban communities, according to St. John, is the fact that the initiative will not help renters, who make up a quarter of Maine households. Landlords would be unlikely to reduce rents if the tax cap is imposed, St. John said. Nor would the cap help the 77 towns - including Harpswell and Georgetown - that already have property tax rates below $10 per $1,000 of assessed value but are facing skyrocketing property valuations, St. John said. Furthermore, he said, about one-third of the tax relief would go to residents of other states who own property in Maine and another 40% would go to Mainers with incomes greater than $72,000, which is nearly twice the state's median income. The tax cap, said St. John, would also result in a loss of 4,000 municipal jobs statewide and services that businesses and residents alike rely upon. That reduction of municipal services could be a deterrent for new businesses thinking of relocating to Maine. And if education suffers, Maine's future work force will not receive adequate training, which also would do little to attract business development, St. John said. "People have been led to believe that it's possible to get more services for less money," he said. St. John argued that the opposite is true, that less money means fewer services. But to Wibby, the loss of municipal jobs is a sad but necessary consequence of the need for cities and towns to reduce spending. "I feel badly for those young people who are going to lose jobs. But if the job is not essential, then find a job that is essential," he said, adding that user fees or local option taxes can pay for any unessential services desired by a community and that people who have become accustomed to receiving services funded disproportionately by wealthy taxpayers will have to get used to going without them. "The people who would like to collect welfare would have to go to work," he said.

  5. New Gloucester short millions if cap OK'd
     Blethen Maine Newspapers via Portland Maine Press Herald, ME
    By ANN S. KIM
    NEW GLOUCESTER, Me. - The town would be unable to make its current payments for local schools, Cumberland County government and solid waste debt if a statewide tax cap is passed and implemented as written, according to an analysis presented to the Board of Selectmen on Monday. Under a scenario that assumes the tax cap passes with a provision that uses 1996-1997 valuations, New Gloucester would be able to raise $1.9 million through property taxes. That's $1.6 million short of the $3.5 million the town is now obligated to pay to the school district, the county and for debt payments. If the Palesky tax initiative is implemented as written, the town expects to lose more than $2.4 million in revenue overall; the town will raise $4.36 million in tax revenue to fund this year's budget. Town officials said it is too soon to know what cuts would be made to town services to compensate for the loss, and that those decisions would be made after discussions among selectmen, department heads and the town manager. But an information sheet provided by the town cited a number of possibilities, including the elimination of staff positions, reduced hours at Town Hall, the library and the transfer station, cuts in road maintenance and infrastructure improvements, and the delay or elimination of major projects that require the town to borrow. Selectmen Chairman Steven Libby said the town was not trying to sway voters on the ballot question. "We're just here to present the facts as best we can," he said. The tax cap measure would limit property taxes statewide to 1% of assessed valuation, or $10 per $1,000. New Gloucester's tax rate is now $11.55 per $1,000 of assessed value. The Maine Municipal Association is using a different method to calculate the effect of the tax cap on individual municipalities. It assumes the rollback provision to 1996-97 values would be unconstitutional, a position supported by a recent advisory opinion of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court. Under that model, which uses current fair market values, New Gloucester would raise $3.9 million in property taxes. That would be enough to pay the town's school, county and debt obligations with about $410,000 left in property tax revenue for town services. The cost of town services for the next fiscal year is $3.45 million. About $1 million in property tax revenue goes toward those services. Money from other sources such as fees, state revenue-sharing and excise taxes pay for the rest. According to the town's analysis, the owner of a home with a value of $150,000 in 1997 and a current value of $215,888, would save $771 in property taxes if the cap went into effect as written. If the rollback provision was struck down, the tax bill savings would be $334.
    Staff Writer Ann Kim can be contacted at 791-6383 or at: akim@pressherald.com

  6. 66% of nurses 'work overtime'
     SAM HALSTEAD
    The Scotsman, UK
    ALMOST two-thirds of nurses and midwives in the Lothians work more than their contracted hours, according to new research. The study by Napier University’s employment research institute also revealed that few workers get paid overtime or time off in lieu for their extra efforts. Only half of the workers surveyed were satisfied with their working hours, the research also showed. The remaining workers involved in the university research, run in conjunction with the NHS, wanted greater control over hours and shift patterns. The researchers found that although the NHS responded to requests for staff to have more input over their working hours, workers with children were given greater priority over childless staff- the group the study claimed were most likely to leave a job. The investigation was based on more than 1000 questionnaires and 64 interviews with qualified nursing and midwifery staff working at Lothian University Hospitals Division, which includes the new Edinburgh Royal Infirmary and the Western General. Sarah Wise, research associate at the employment research institute at Napier University, said: "The research highlights the importance of work-life balance policies and practices for the recruitment and retention of NHS nurses and midwives and many examples of best practice were found. "However, as in other sectors, too little attention has been paid to the challenges of front-line implementation. For these policies to be effective, employee welfare and work-life balance needs to occupy a more central position in workload and workforce planning at the national and local level." Isabel McCallum, director of nursing for the university hospitals division, said: "We recognise the importance of a good work-life balance. In all walks of life people seem to be working longer hours and the findings have provided very useful information to incorporate into our plans to address this issue. "A work-life balance group has been established within the Division and are working to plan and implement improvements. "As part of NHS Lothian’s drive to improve working conditions for all its staff, a recruitment and retention workshop was held recently at St. John’s Hospital. The workshop was aimed at a wide range of nursing and midwifery staff and the main issues highlighted were around attracting staff, retaining staff and offering maximum flexibility to take into account the needs of individuals, whilst ensuring appropriate 24-hour-seven-days-a-week cover in some of the busiest hospitals in Scotland." James Kennedy, director of the Royal College of Nursing Scotland, said: "RCN Scotland welcomes Napier University’s research which highlights the direct link between appropriate work-life balances and the recruitment and retention of nurses in Scotland. "If two-thirds of nurses work overtime, as indicated in the research, then we clearly do not have the right number of nurses in Scotland. "Urgent action is needed to address this issue. Currently, the number of nurses entering the healthcare service is merely replacing those who are leaving. "With increasing pressures on the healthcare service, nurses’ workloads are greater than ever - this is not acceptable. "The Executive needs to live up to their promise of recruiting and retaining more nurses in Scotland so we see a real growth in the nursing workforce." Shona Robison, SNP health spokeswoman, added: "I think this is an abuse of staff who will always go the extra mile. If they are treating staff in this manner, then it is little wonder that so many are leaving the profession."

  7. 2005 draft budget offers sweeping reforms - Ambitious plan calls for elimination of a number of ministries - Even army, security personnel aren't safe from cuts aimed at reigning in debt
     Daily Star, Lebanon
    By Osama Habib
    BEIRUT, Lebanon - Overambitious is the best word to describe Finance Minister Fouad Siniora's 2005 draft budget. The new budget, yet to be approved by the outgoing Cabinet and the Parliament, calls for sweeping reforms in overstaffed public departments. One of the biggest surprises in the new draft budget was a clause calling for the elimination of the Ministry of the Displaced, the Council of the South and the state security apparatus. The budget goes even further, underlining the need to cut the number of army and security forces personnel. If these suggestions are approved, the Finance Ministry projects a budget deficit of 25.2% and GDP growth of 5% by the end of 2005 compared to a projected deficit of 30% in 2004. The draft budget projects revenue of LL7.160 trillion ($4.72 billion) and expenditure of LL9.575 trillion. Spending reaches LL11.057 trillion if allocations for the Telecommunication Ministry and National Lottery are included. The budget projects revenue of LL5.236 billion from taxes and LL1.897 trillion from non-tax sources. An official at the Finance Ministry told The Daily Star that revenues in 2005 are expected to be high, adding that tax and nontax revenues in 2004 may reach over LL6.4 trillion or $4.2 billion. The official said that the allocations to the defense and education ministries will be slightly higher in 2005 due to the surge in the prices of fuel, electricity and telephones. The bill proposes a 3% cut of public sector salaries to finance social benefits. But the budget did not call for new taxes, although it said the time has come to impose taxes on coastal properties, which were originally approved a few years ago. The $35 billion public debt has badly affected the Lebanese economy, and there are signs that worse is to come. Privatization is on hold and every passing day reduces the chances of selling state owned assets to the private sector. To make matters worse, the UN Security Council is expected to convene soon to discuss the alleged violation of the Lebanese Constitution, via the extension of President Emile Lahoud's term. This means that pressure from the U.S. and France will increase on Lebanon, and this could damage the government's chances of obtaining more soft loans to reduce debt servicing. Siniora managed to reduce the budget deficit this year despite the lack of substantive reform. It fell in the first seven months of 2004 compared with the same period last year, thanks to higher government revenues and lower spending, the Finance Ministry said Friday. The deficit reached 26.04% in the first seven months of the year (LL1.556 trillion) compared with 37.43% in 2003. Total government revenues in the first seven months rose 11.98% to LL4.420 trillion; spending fell 5.27% to LL5.976 trillion. Lebanon received $2.5 billion in soft loans from France, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Malaysia and other countries following 2002's "Paris II" donor conference. The cash injection was used to reduce debt servicing, which consumes a large part of the government's budget, but the government failed to take advantage of this opportunity and did not cut spending. The budget calls for the elimination of lawmakers' allowances for gasoline and telephone calls as well as allowances for former MPs. Siniora also wants to adjust the working hours of all ministries, public departments and state-owned schools and hospitals. This means government employees will put in more hours each week without additional benefits. It is estimated that there are over 200,000 civil servants, public teachers, and army and security personnel on the government payroll. The bill said that the salaries and end of service benefits of the government staff represent 36% of the total budget. The cost of debt servicing, on the other hand, is 45% of the 2005 draft budget, compared to 45.74% in 2004. Many businessmen and economists have called for the number of public employees to be reduced and spending to be cut to reduce the budget deficit, but these steps were never taken because the government feared a social backlash from these unpopular measures. Siniora also wants to scrap the state security directorate general, which has over 1,000 personnel and is attached to the premier's office. According to the bill, all state security assets will be transferred to the Internal Security Forces; officers and the unit's personnel will be offered an end of service package. The draft budget would limit the number of volunteers of all ranks in the army to 25,000 and 3,000 civilians. There are about 55,000 soldiers and reservists in the army, and total spending on the defense and the security forces tops $1.2 billion a year, almost 20% of the total budget. Siniora also wants the army draftees to serve six months in the military instead of one year. Eliminating the Ministry of the Displaced, the Central Refugee Fund and the Council of the South will surely trigger widespread protest. The Ministry of the Displaced was created to help refugees displaced during the war return to their villages and homes. It is unclear how much the government spent on this, but sources estimate the figure exceeds $1 billion. Some Druze and Christian MPs say more money is needed to bring refugees back. "Siniora's bold bill will probably meet lot of resistance from inside and outside the government," one economist said. "But (he) has sent a warning that unpopular measures are badly needed these days."

  8. Kmart boosts 401(k) plans - Retailer hopes to improve morale, will match contributions dollar-for-dollar up to 3%
     DetNews.com, MI
    By Tenisha Mercer / The Detroit News
    Benefit boost - Kmart Holding Corp. will match employee contributions to their 401(k) plan on a dollar-for-dollar basis up to 3% of their total earnings. - The retailer will match contributions from 3% up to 8% at a rate of 50 cents per dollar. TROY - Kmart Holding Corp., buoyed by profits and its climbing stock, will increase employee retirement benefits next year, a move that could boost the morale of workers who lost part or all of their nest eggs when the former Kmart spiraled into Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The Troy-based retailer plans to begin matching employee contributions on a dollar-for-dollar basis up to 3% of their total earnings and 50 cents per dollar on contributions beyond 3% up to 8%, according to several employees who were notified of the change. Currently, the company matches 401(k) employee contributions 50 cents per dollar up to 6%. In a statement, Kmart said it's striving "to create a competitive benefits package, including a company savings plan that will help attract and retain top-notch talent." The company declined to discuss details, saying employee benefits are confidential. The increase in the company's 401(k) benefits is a "positive sign" for the company that since filing for bankruptcy in 2002 closed 600 stores and cut 57,000 jobs, said Kenneth J. Dalto, a benefits expert and turnaround consultant in Farmington Hills. "After all the stuff they've been through, they are rewarding their loyal employees, people who stuck by them," Dalto said. "Kmart has to increase morale, motivate employees and develop a sense of long-term stability. What better way to do that ... than with their 401(k)?" Kmart employees lost millions of dollars in retirement funds and other estimates as the former Kmart Corp. entered bankruptcy and eventually canceled more than 500 million shares of stock on May 6, 2003. Edward S. Lampert, a billionaire Wall Street investment banker who bought a majority interest in the company during its bankruptcy, has implemented a series of cost-cutting moves that has affected employees. Earlier this year, the company eliminated automatic pay increases in favor of merit raises, switched health-care providers and eliminated payroll checks in favor of debit cards to save money. The retailer also cut hours for thousands of employees, sharply reducing its full-time work force.
    [Cutting hours is better than cutting jobs, but we prefer to cut the hours of our definition of "full time."]
    And in August, [however,] it cut 220 jobs at its Troy headquarters. In another cost-cutting move, Kmart is scouting for new, smaller corporate headquarters. Two thousand employees now occupy 1 million square feet of space designed for nearly 6,000. "They are trying to keep people happy and retain employees when demand for employment is improving," said Ulysses Yannas, a retail analyst with Buckman, Buckman & Reid in Red Bank, N.J. Former Kmart employee Curtis Borders lost $1,200 when shares of the old Kmart became worthless, but is hopeful the company can restore profits to employees who lost their investments. More than 500 million shares of stock in Kmart Corp. were canceled on May 6, 2003. "I've always thought highly of Kmart," said Borders, 55, who worked at Kmart until May, but still has investments in its 401(k) plan. "I want them to succeed, not because of the company, but because of the employees. They have a lot of time and money tied up in it." Kmart investors lost more than $5 billion in equity in 2001 and 2002, but the company's stock has roared back in recent months, trading as high as $90.20 a share. Kmart shares closed up 29 cents to $85.85 in trading Tuesday. Many investors are betting that Lampert can continue his track record of turning around struggling companies. Publicly, Lampert has said he wants to turn Kmart around, but his strategy is often compared to that of Warren Buffett, who used Berkshire Hathaway as an investment vehicle. Lampert is known for making huge returns by investing in distressed companies such as Sears, AutoNation, Auto Zone and Payless Shoes. Under Lampert, the company has amassed a cash stockpile of $2.6 billion, mostly from the sale of real estate. Last month, Kmart sold 18 stores to Home Depot Inc. for $271 million. Kmart also plans to sell up to 54 stores to Sears for up to $621 million. Although it has struggled to fend off competition from Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Target Corp., Kmart has turned a profit for three consecutive quarters. It reported a net income of $155 million for the 13 weeks that ended July 28. That compares with a net loss of $5 million for the same period in 2003.
    You can reach Tenisha Mercer at (313) 222-2401 or at tmercer@detnews.com

  9. Are you committing karoshi (Japanese for 'working yourself to death')?
     by Kimiko L. Martinez, Indianapolis Star via Quad City Times, IA
    Whether your job calls for it, your employer expects it or you just need to pay the bills, working seemingly endless hours is just a way of life, right? Doesn't everybody check their e-mail and voicemail on their days off? Or work two jobs to make ends meet? Unfortunately, for too many Americans, putting in more than 40 hours a week is commonplace. According to a 2000 Bureau of Labor Statistics report, about four in 10 men employed as managers or professionals in 1999 found themselves working at least 49 hours per week. That's up from about three in 10 in the early '80s. For women, the rate is about half the men's, but the slow increase over the past two decades has remained steady for both. What starts out as taking on extra responsibilities to get that promotion or nail that presentation can turn into an unhealthy habit of bringing work home and neglecting other responsibilities due to job responsibilities. And before you know it, you're married to your job.
    Benjamin Klage...puts in more than 75 hours each week between two full-time jobs, spending 40 hours per week as a sales associate at Wal-Mart and another 37 hours at Verizon's online DSL technical support call center. "I have no social life," Klage said. "And the down time I do have is spent catching up on sleep or trying to get overtime at one job or the other."
    Catherine Turissini was in a similar situation several years ago. One summer during college, Turissini, now 27, was juggling an unpaid summer internship, a part-time job at a children's bookstore and a third job waitressing. "It was 75 hours a week and when I got back to school my senior year, I was exhausted, but it was easy," Turissini said. "It was a vacation to go back to school."
    Like Klage, Turissini was simply doing what she had to do to make sure the bills got paid.
    [Hey, maybe these two should get together.]
    But even now that the bills are less of a worry, Turissini can put in anywhere from 40 to 60 hours each week at the office, traveling and coordinating work-related projects as a special assistant for policy and planning for Indiana Lt. Gov. Kathy Davis. She spends several more hours each month volunteering for Davis and Gov. Joe Kernan's re-election campaigns.
    Klage, on the other hand, doesn't have much choice. A divorce settlement, student loans, car payment and other living expenses dictate that Klage continue the grueling pace. And it could be more than another year before he sees any relief. "I would like to have a dating life of some sort," Klage said. "I miss having a girlfriend or wife to come home to."
    American society preaches that hard work will get you anywhere, so working 50- and 60-plus hours per week practically earns an employee a merit badge these days. It's all just part of achieving that American Dream. "Steeped within the American tradition is productivity," said psychologist Paul Riley, of the St. Vincent Stress Center in Indianapolis. "We learn that you can succeed anywhere." The Japanese even have a word for it - karoshi, which means working yourself to death. Karoshi received national attention during the economic boom of the 1980s. And since then, more than 30,000 Japanese have been diagnosed as victims. A national pension system was even set up for the surviving members of karoshi victims' families. The United States isn't likely to follow suit. Lawmakers don't even require vacation time for American workers, making the United States the only developed country that doesn't actually mandate it. "America is set up the wrong way," Riley said. "Wouldn't it be nice if everything shut down in August, like in France, and they have a good holiday and take to the woods and so forth? It's not easy to change that mentality. But truly creative and productive people need time off."

  10. Parents, teachers bend board's ears - Salinas district's finances could be put in hands of county if it can't meet reserve test
    The Salinas Californian, CA
    by Kelly Nix
    Salinas Elementary School District teachers walk a picket line outside of Henry F. Kammann Elementary School in north Salinas on Monday prior to a district board meeting at the school. Teachers say they are upset by the district's financial state of affairs as well as some of the things the district is trying to do to remedy the situation.
    WHAT'S NEXT
    The Salinas City Elementary School District has scheduled a special board meeting at 6 p.m. Thursday at the district office, 840 S. Main St., to discuss the budget, which it must revise by Friday. The Salinas City Elementary School District school board Monday got an earful from angry parents and teachers about the district's dire financial straits. Salinas City has fallen below the state required 1.5% in reserve funds and risks being fiscally managed by the Monterey County Office of Education if it can't show that reserve level by Friday. "The biggest problem right now is a culture of spending," said Larry Mead, vice president of the Salinas Elementary Teachers Council, the teachers union. Mead made the comment while picketing with about 75 other teachers in front of Henry F. Kammann Elementary School about 30 minutes before the board meeting was held there. The meeting drew about 200 people. Teachers and Mead said they're also upset because they feel they're being asked to bail out the district. "We haven't had a pay raise for three years," said Barbara Taylor, a first-grade teacher at Mission Park Elementary School, before the meeting. Teachers also said they're upset because the Salinas district has suggested they take days off, or furlough days, to save money, and wants them to accept reduced health benefits. While the buzz at the meeting was that the district is at least $2 million in deficit, a preliminary report outlined by district officials at the meeting indicated it had about a $612,000 deficit in its general fund. Salinas City's annual budget is $63 million. Teachers addressing the board also criticized the board decision to pay Superintendent Rob Slaby about $250,000 for his retirement package. Donna Vaughan, the district's former personnel director, will replace Slaby as interim superintendent when he retires Dec. 31. Slaby said he'll continue his education career at Chapman University and San Jose State University as a professor or an associate professor.
    Contact Kelly Nix at knix@salinas.gannett.com

  11. Aurora furlough plan decried - 200 cops, firefighters protest at city hall, saying residents at risk
    Denver Post, CO
    By Jeremy Meyer
    Deryk Delahanty, 7, holds a sign while accompanying his father, Keith, right, who was among about 200 Aurora police officers and firefighters at city hall on Monday to protest a money-saving policy forcing emergency workers to take three unpaid days off. Union leaders and city officials disagree whether the furloughs put the public at risk. Aurora - About 200 rank-and-file police officers and firefighters carried protest signs, cursed city management and crowded city hall steps Monday to decry forced furloughs. The city of Aurora recently began making each of its 600 police officers and 250 firefighters take three days of unpaid leave before the year's end. Aurora is trying to cut $11 million in spending to balance its 2005 budget. Officials say sluggish sales-tax revenues and increased expenditures have put the city in a financial bind. Emergency workers, however, call it poor financial planning. Representatives from the police and firefighter unions say Aurora's citizens are at risk because of the cutbacks. "The management of this city has decided you can do with fewer police officers and fewer firemen," said Don James, president of the Aurora Police Association. "I pray to God that no innocent citizens or members of the Aurora Police Department or Aurora Fire Department are injured because of short staffing." Lt. Hunter Hackbarth, president of the Aurora Fire Fighters Protective Association, said all emergency workers are concerned. "Six firefighters and four police officers aren't where they belong," he said. "... You, the citizens, are at risk." City Manager Ron Miller, target of much of the crowd's derision, said public safety is the city's top priority and no one is at risk. Schedules will be adjusted so all areas of the city are covered, Miller said, and mutual aid agreements are in place if the city needs more help. The furloughs are no different than when police or fire departments are short-staffed because of illness, he said. "The union leadership is doing a disservice both to its membership and the community," Miller said. "They're trying to create panic in the community. Police and fire emergency response times will be maintained at all proper levels." He suggested the matter is really a labor dispute taken public. Police officers and firefighters won't get raises next year. The police contract went into arbitration this summer, with the arbiter agreeing with the city on most issues. The furlough matter also went to an arbiter, who again sided with the city. City officials say furloughing emergency workers will save Aurora $600,000 in wages and will mean fewer cuts for next year. Nonemergency workers also are being forced to take three days off at a savings of $600,000. Cops and firefighters already get five weeks of paid leave every year, said Frank Ragan, deputy city manager. And the police union negotiated an additional 120 hours of "comp time." "They didn't say anything about negative impacts to the public or officer safety about that," Ragan said. The city is in the middle of its 2005 budget process. Miller's proposed cuts include closing two city pools, a recreation center and a library. He suggests using $3.1 million in reserve funds. Eleven years ago, voters approved a ballot measure that required Aurora have two officers for every 1,000 people. The city was allowed to increase sales taxes to pay for the program, but the sales tax revenue isn't keeping up. Police officers and firefighters, meanwhile, say the city is more interested in building opulent edifices, such as the new $71 million Aurora Municipal Building, than putting cops and fire engines on the street. Miller and Ragan say that's not true. The new city hall consolidates city offices that had been in 13 locations, and plans were put in play when the economy was stronger.
    Staff writer Jeremy Meyer can be reached at 303-751-2621 or jpmeyer@denverpost.com

  12. College football's job share program - Some schools effectively use 2 players at 1 position
    MSNBC
    by Barry Svrluga
    When Laurence Maroney came to Minneapolis for his recruiting visit, as the University of Minnesota tried to lure him from his home in St. Louis, he was well aware of the other running back in the room. Marion Barber III had the pedigree - the son of a former NFL and all-Big Ten back - and the accomplishments, having run for more than 700 yards as a freshman. There was no reason for Barber to believe he would be, some day, sharing his job. Maroney hadn't yet arrived on campus, hadn't yet shown that he, too, could reel off a hundred yards a night. Yet the sense of an in-house rivalry was already there. "We really didn't say nothing to each other," Maroney said this week. "To be honest, we really didn't like each other." Saturday night, when Penn State comes to Minneapolis to face the 18th-ranked Golden Gophers, Maroney and Barber will provide perhaps the nation's best example of how two players with one goal can perform a single job. "I'm his backup," Maroney said, "and he's my backup." € Area college coverage € College football coverage Share the ball, share the love. It's happening at Minnesota, at Auburn, at Southern California, from coast to coast, on teams both bad and good. Of the 25 teams ranked in The Associated Press poll this week, 12 are splitting the job of primary running back, four are splitting time at quarterback, and two - Louisiana State and Tennessee - are splitting both. And that doesn't begin to address the other places it's happening. "It's not a case where you're trying to pacify people," said South Carolina Coach Lou Holtz, who has started playing two quarterbacks himself. "You're trying to win." The job-sharing programs are happening for a variety of reasons. Some, such as Minnesota, have two studs - Maroney and Barber are the Big Ten's top two rushers. Others, such as LSU - where senior Marcus Randall and redshirt freshman JaMarcus Russell are trading off at quarterback - would love one to distinguish himself, and it hasn't happened. And still others are doing it out of philosophy, such as at Georgia, where the Bulldogs are simultaneously promoting senior quarterback David Greene for the Heisman Trophy while trying to get supremely talented junior D.J. Shockley into the lineup. "You want your second team to play," Georgia Coach Mark Richt said. "It's good for morale, and it's good for a situation if you have an injury to your starter. I mean, my gosh, if you never give your second-teamers a chance to play, and your number one guy gets hurt, then what you probably have is a guy who's a little bit bummed out because he hasn't gotten to play, and a guy who's probably not ready to play." Negative Recruit Indeed, coaches nationwide say it has become nearly essential to play backups, regardless of position, to develop depth. Injuries are too common in football to be able rely on a single player week after week. Players, though, rarely want to hear that. Most react as Barber did when Maroney was being recruited: Here's someone trying to take my job. And when coaches go into living rooms on recruiting trips, they hear the questions about the players already on the roster, those who would, ostensibly, be ahead of them in line. "Kids are able to get on the Internet and find out everything now," Maryland recruiting coordinator James Franklin said. "Before, they had to go by what the coaches were telling them. Now, they actually are worrying and thinking about a lot more things than maybe they need to be. Other programs will use that stuff and 'negative recruit' against you. They'll say, 'Look at their roster. Look at who's at your position.' All those factors come up." Therefore, it can be dicey. The Greene-Shockley situation perhaps best illustrates this dynamic. In 2000, Georgia won a hotly contested recruiting battle for Shockley - who SuperPrep magazine rated the top quarterback in the country - despite the fact that Greene was already on campus. Shockley redshirted in 2001 while Greene played as a redshirt freshman. The following fall, while Greene continued to improve, the coaches worked to get Shockley playing time as well. Occasionally, there were cries from fans to make Shockley the starter. It never happened. On Saturday against LSU, Greene will make his 43rd straight start. Shockley thought seriously about transferring before his sophomore season, but Richt talked him into staying. The two continue to share the job, but Shockley's playing time has diminished each season, which makes for quite a topic of conversation in Athens, Ga. "With a quarterback, it's just a little bit more difficult because everybody wants to make a big stink about it," Richt said. "Did he get in? Didn't he get in? Well, everybody notices that. . . . You just got to be a little more mindful of the psychology of that position." Richt is both mindful of and realistic about that psychology. He commended the way Shockley has handled the situation - "He's done a good job not trying to make a mess of everything" - but thinks the media's constant questioning over the past three years has worn on him. Greene has thrown 82 passes this season, Shockley nine. "It's tough on him," Richt said. "I mean, when his name gets called to speak to the media, it's like, 'How do you feel about it? How do you feel about it?' . . . Nobody likes not playing a lot. [They ask] 'Don't you wish you played more?' 'Well, yeah, I wish I played more,' is what he's thinking." The coach on the opposite sideline this week in Athens wishes he had such a problem, an over-abundance of experience and talent. LSU's Nick Saban began the season playing both Randall and Russell with the hope one would jump up and, as Saban said, "take the bull by the horns, and we would go in that direction. I'm not sure that's happened yet." Randall, who served as the backup to Matt Mauck during LSU's national championship campaign last year, has thrown fewer passes for fewer yards than Russell in each of the Tigers' four games thus far. Yet Russell, Saban says, still mixes in too much of his youth with his talent. So when the Tigers face the Bulldogs in a game they likely need to win to keep alive SEC title hopes, both quarterbacks will play. "It's delicate to try to balance, to be fair," Saban said, "and develop the kind of things that you need to develop in your offense."
    Healthy Situation
    Figuring who to choose can be as trying on the coaches as it is on the players. North Carolina State sputtered offensively behind junior quarterback Jay Davis two weeks ago against Ohio State. So entering last Saturday's game at Virginia Tech, the Wolfpack coaching staff decided to insert freshman Marcus Stone on the third series of the game. The two shared duty for the remainder of the first half, and then Stone - despite the fact he connected on only 2 of 7 passes - played all but one series after the break. The result was a 17-16 victory, but no real sense of how a rotation works. "Pretty much, I was just waiting after I came off for a series," said Stone, who scored the go-ahead touchdown on a one-yard run. "I'd either hear the coaches say I was going in, or Jay was going in. We didn't really have much conversation about it." Immediately after the game, N.C. State Coach Chuck Amato said, "I'm not going to let emotion carry us into a decision. We're going to go back and analyze what they both did." Which, apparently, led to no concrete conclusion, because this week against Wake Forest, N.C. State will start Davis, and Stone will come in on the third series, and the coaches will decide what to do from there. But maybe Wolfpack fans need not shudder about the uncertainty. Maybe it's just the norm. "I think it's a healthy situation," Davis said. Tennessee, with hosts Auburn in a matchup of unbeatens, believes its situation is healthy as well. The Volunteers have two freshmen - Erik Ainge and Brent Schaeffer - sharing the quarterback duties. In recent weeks, Ainge has been more consistent, particularly when he led the Vols from behind in a dramatic 30-28 victory over Florida. But Tennessee Coach Phillip Fulmer said he will continue to use Schaeffer - or at least threaten to use him - because he's a better runner. The opposing defense, then, must prepare for two different styles. "The dynamics of these two together give us something that can give defenses problems," Fulmer said, "if not during the game, then during preparation. . . . It's hard for a defensive team to make those transitions." Coaches and players agree that the transition at running back is a bit easier, because the position is less taxing mentally but can be more demanding physically than quarterback. Top-ranked USC is among the nation's most dangerous teams in part because it uses two tailbacks, sophomores LenDale White and Reggie Bush. Either can carry the ball at any point, either can break a long run, either can take the heat off quarterback Matt Leinart. And their rushing numbers are nearly identical. There are examples throughout the top 25. Miami does it with Tyler Moss and Frank Gore, Florida State with Leon Washington and Lorenzo Booker, Auburn with Carnell Williams and Ronnie Brown. No one, however, does it as dominantly as Maroney and Barber. Long ago, they put their tensions aside, and started, as Maroney said, "click-clacking." Through four games, all victories, they have combined for 1,040 yards on 158 carries, good for 10 touchdowns. Maroney is ranked 10th in the nation in rushing, Barber 11th. It works, Maroney said, because they both believe there are enough handoffs to go around. "It really would take two guys who get along to make it work," Maroney said. "If two people didn't like each other, then someone might be going to [other] players, or to coaches, and complaining, like, 'I want the ball more.' "We don't do that. Me and him, we're best friends."

  13. Find your balance of home and work
    North Devon Gazette & Advertiser, UK
    LOCAL employers and their staff can find out how to achieve a better work-home balance at a roadshow next month. The advice sessions in Barnstaple and Bideford will give information to both parties on ways to manage the responsibilities at the office and in leisure time. For workers this can mean dealing with issues such as childcare, caring for an elderly relative or arranging time off. For employers it involves facing problems such as low morale, stress-related absences and problems with retaining staff. The sessions are being staged by the Devon Work-Life Balance Forum as part of the County Council's Devon In Touch Roadshow. Representatives from the six organisations that make up the forum, including the Citizens Advice Bureau and JobcentrePlus, will be on hand to offer advice. Tom Flint, marketing officer for Zero14plus, who are co-ordinating the roadshow, said: "Work-life balance has serious benefits for employers and employees. "Many people today face issues such as caring for an elderly relative or picking up children from school which can fall outside regular 9-5 office hours. "If both parties sit down together they can usually find a flexible solution - for example part-time working or job sharing." "Employers can come along to the roadshow to find out how to get happier and better motivated staff." The roadshow will stop off at Bideford High Street on Tuesday, October 12, and Library Square in Barnstaple on Friday, October 15, from noon to 6pm. For more details call (0800) 0563666 or visit www.devon-.gov.uk/disc

  14. Tamshui rated top destination for local recreation, survey says eTaiwan News, Taiwan
    / Central News Agency /
    The coastal town of Tamshui north of Taipei is the most popular recreational destination in Taiwan, according to the results of an opinion survey released yesterday. The telephone survey of 18,807 randomly chosen local citizens aged 12 and over, conducted by the Tourism Bureau between January and December 2003, was aimed at exploring local people's travel preferences. Survey results showed that the respondents most liked to visit Tamshui for its convenient traffic and beautiful natural scenery. The other popular destinations making the top-10 list were the National Museum of Marine Biology and Aquarium in Pingtung County, the Chihpen Spa Scenic Area in Taitung County, the Chichi railway branch in Nantou County, Sun Moon Lake in Nantou County, the Shihlin night market in Taipei City, Chingching Recreational Farm in Nantou County, Ocean Park in Hualien County, Puli in Nantou County and the Alishan Mountain Resort, in that order. Tourist officials said domestic travel has become increasingly popular following the implementation of the five-day work week system. Quoting the survey results, the officials said more than 60% of the respondents enjoyed most taking a one-day trip and 90% said they preferred to organize their domestic travel itineraries by themselves instead of through a travel agency.

  15. Some manufacturers say alu-zinc supplies short
    Jamaica Observer, Jamaica
    Observer Reporter
    There are conflicting reports over the availability of alu-zinc roofing sheets for which demand has skyrocketed since the passage of Hurricane Ivan almost three weeks ago. Some manufacturers say there has been a severe shortage of the commodity because of a worldwide shortage of the raw material - 28 gauge alu-zinc. Hundreds of homes lost their roofs when Hurricane Ivan, a Category Four storm, lashed the island with wind speeds of up to 150 miles per hour, prompting a call for the importation of more raw material to speed up the supply of zinc. But Tank-Weld Limited, a major zinc manufacturer, is adamant that there is no cause for panic... at least, not yet. "There is a worldwide shortage of alu-zinc, it's a fact, but Jamaica has enough alu-zinc in stock to meet current demands," Tank-Weld's managing director Bruce Bicknell told the Observer. According to Bicknell, Jamaicans, under normal circumstances, use about 450 tonnes of alu-zinc each month. However, since the passage of Hurricane Ivan the demand has almost tripled, forcing many manufacturers to run 24-hour shifts and extending the work week to seven days. But while Bicknell is upbeat about the outlook in terms of supply and demand, other manufacturers, like ARC Systems, are worried. "ARC does not have enough raw material and we are currently waiting on supplies," Canute Salmon, an executive of ARC Systems Limited, said. According to Salmon, should the shipment arrive in time, his company would be able to keep up with the current demand, but otherwise "we will definitely run out" of alu-zinc. "If people are going to be re-roofing with alu-zinc sheets, it is going to take a while before everyone is satisfied because the raw material is running out," said Salmon. Salmon, however, admitted that though demand has significantly increased, the industry will this week get a more accurate picture of the volume required. "At this time we are just trying to work fast to fill our orders," he said. Another large manufacturer, Tropicair, also admitted that its stock was running out. "We are running short of material, we are almost out of stock," said the company's sales and marketing manager Neville Lindo. Lindo said the company has been running 10-hour shifts and six-day work weeks since Hurricane Ivan to meet the demand. Tropical Metal Products Limited, in the meanwhile, said it too had increased production, but was concerned about the availability of raw material. "There is a shortage and this has been going on for almost one year because raw material only comes every six months," said the company's general manager John McKinley. According to McKinley, his company has been swamped with orders and while it has been able to fill them, he feared that the coming weeks could prove difficult. "We have been trying to work a little extra days to satisfy our customers because demand for roofing has increased since Hurricane Ivan but I can see that there will be a shortage," he told the Observer.

  16. Report Says Close Fire Station 3, Re-open Fire Station 17 WHOI, IL
    by Josh Brogadir
    PEORIA, Ill. - Closing one fire station and re-opening another is just one part of a consultant's report on the Peoria Fire Department. Residents have very different views on the proposal depending on where they live in the city. Station Three has been part of the Armstrong Avenue community as far back as Marvin Moredock can remember. Bourland Avenue resident Marvin Moredock says, "The fire station's been down there since I was little. We used to go down there and get 25 cent sodas." And he says closing it would have a major impact on the neighborhood. Moredock said, "I don't think they should move. I think they should stay there just in case there's a fire over here, you know, they don't have far to travel." But across town sentiment is different. While some residents may be upset that the Armstrong Avenue Fire Station may be closing, others here at the Skyline Drive Fire Station are pleased that it may reopen. Skyline Drive Resident Mary Corrigan said, "I think our neighborhood association would be tickled pink to see that happen, and I think the senior citizens communities down below us would also welcome that." Station 17's location attracted Skyline Drive resident Mary Corrigan and her family to the area 15 years ago. Corrigan said, "That frankly was one reason we moved here too was that we had a fire station close to us and we weren't going to be in a terribly remote area." And Corrigan is right about how the change could affect hundreds of seniors at Lutheran Hillside Village. Lutheran Hillside Village's CEO Ron Jaeger said, "In the event that we would ever have an emergency, it would be nice to make that response time as short as possible, and across the street is about as short as you can get." A response time Peoria leaders will have to face in deciding the proposal's impact on neighborhoods throughout the city. The proposal includes having two battalion chiefs on duty at all times and increasing firefighters' work week from 52 hours to 53 hours, which could potentially mean laying off firefighters.

  17. George W. Bush Ain't No Cowboy
    Village Voice, NY
    by Erik Baard
    George W. Bush is a fake cowboy. From media accounts, you'd reckon that the president was a buckaroo to the bones. He plays up the image, big-time, with $300 designer cowboy boots, a $1,000 cowboy hat, and his 1,600-acre Prairie Chapel Ranch in Crawford, Texas. He guns his rhetoric with frontier lingo, saying that he'll "ride herd" over ornery Middle Eastern governments and "smoke out" enemies in wild mountain passes. He branded Saddam Hussein's Iraq "an outlaw regime" and took the vanquished dictator's pistol as a trophy. As for Osama bin Laden, Bush declared, "I want justice. And there's an old poster out West, I recall, that says, 'Wanted: Dead or Alive.' " Britain's liberal newspaper The Guardian noted that "such language feeds the image overseas of Mr. Bush as a hopelessly inarticulate, trigger-happy cowboy."
    But liberals from both coasts and Europeans who derisively call Bush a "cowboy" foolishly insult not Bush, but one of America's prime ennobling myths. Instead of ridiculing the myth exploited by George W. Bush, they may want to measure him against it.
    "The idea of the American cowboy is the direct lineal descendant of the chivalric knight," observes Bonnie Wheeler, a medievalist in cowboy country. "The only serious difference is that your status doesn't depend on your social class." Editor of Arthuriana, the journal of Arthurian studies, Wheeler teaches at Southern Methodist University in Dallas.
    "Our president," she says, "is neither a knight nor a cowboy. He doesn't believe in taking care of the little guy, nor does he have the restraint or dignity of the cowboy."
    Children of Bush's generation grew up knowing of the Cowboy Code, which echoed the chivalric one. It was written by screen cowboy Gene Autry. In real life too, this lifelong Democrat was the kind of white-hat cowboy our president presents himself to be. Autry was the son of an itinerant cattle driver and horse trader in rural Texas and Oklahoma. He was a recreational small-aircraft pilot, but during World War II he paid for his own flight lessons on larger planes so he could serve in the Air Transport Command on the war front, instead of being stuck at a domestic base. Ultimately he flew explosive supplies (ammunition and fuel) over the Himalayas. A grateful U.S. Army bestowed a singular honor on Autry: He alone was allowed to wear his cowboy boots in uniform.
    This is about more than having a big ranch. Like the knight, the cowboy is an ideal to which people aspire, Wheeler says, regardless of its mundane historical origins. And Autry's code still carries resonance in red states. Voters there, including the Wild West swing states of Colorado and Nevada, might want to think twice about returning a soft-handed wannabe to the White House. Here's how Bush stacks up against the Cowboy Code:
    1. The Cowboy must never shoot first, hit a smaller man, or take unfair advantage. The doctrine of preemptive war, the centerpiece of Bush policy in Iraq and for the "war on terror," is one for the black hats. In 1902, five years before Gene Autry was born, Owen Wister's bestselling novel The Virginian elevated the cowboy to a national symbol. "It's not a brave man that's dangerous. It's the cowards that scare me," a card dealer observes early in th