Steven Pearlstein wrote an article this week that encapsulates way better than I can summarize, the greed of CEOs versus the hired help. In this case, it’s airline executives contrasted with the skycaps who lost most of the tips they receive for curbside check-in when American Airlines imposed a $2 per bag fee that the [...]
Continue reading about Moral Outrage Feels Good But Changes Nothing
Perhaps I should have noted it then, but in posting my comment on the passing of Martin Luther King and mentioning my mother’s teaching me about the evils of racism, I missed the fact that she died exactly five years before King. As I came to visit her in the hospital that day in 1963, [...]
Whoa, now there’s a term you don’t see much anymore. It refers to a manufacturer or business concentrating production of parts, supplies, etc., into wholly owned subsidiaries rather than non-owned suppliers. Not to bite the hand that might someday feed me, but Amazon (like many other corporations) is jumping now while the laissez faire antitrust [...]
Contemplating a divorce? Too bad; it happens, even if you have tried to make the marriage work. But a word of caution based on my career in consumer protection and legal training: If you own property together, make sure the divorce decree properly handles the division of real estate.
Continue reading about The Perils of Incomplete Divorce Settlements
We had an enjoyable time at Disneyworld this February, save for one sour taste their customer service left in our mouths–and in our pocket book. Disney puts on a great show, treats patrons graciously at all their attractions, but when it comes to money–there is no compromise, no negotiation, no capitulation to the old credo [...]
Continue reading about Disneyworld is Always Right; the Customer is Wrong
Perception, some say, is reality. It comports well with Buddhism. If you view things with the Buddha’s eye, however, your perception will be clearer. What I mean by that is that by making more explicit the link between one’s values and one’s behavior, perception will be positively influenced. For example, in the case of the [...]
In an article in today’s Washington Post, Shankar Vedantam uses on odd tack on the Eliot Spitzer debacle to illustrate an interesting point about human behavior. Reporting on a study published in the National Academy of Sciences, Vedantam describes how an awareness of the price apparently influences a person’s actual perception of an item’s value. In [...]
Earlier this winter I needed (I thought) a part for my furnace. I went to the local Sears parts store but they didn’t stock the item. It being winter and cold without a working furnace, I agreed to pay Sears an expedited shipping charge for the part. When it didn’t arrive after a few days, [...]
Talking with Woody Hochswender a couple days ago, author of The Buddha in Your Rearview Mirror, he mentioned the people in his neighborhood who earn money exclusively on investments; they are affluent retirees who produce nothing used by anyone. Of course, many of us (myself included) may aspire to such a life. The subject came up in the [...]
So the global markets are slumping in fear of the USA sliding into recession. What is the prescription to get us out of that, Dubya says we need economic stimulus, i.e., more tax cats (OK, a rebate; same thing). Haven’t we had tax cuts for all the years of his administration? That turned a surplus [...]