79-01-B5
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Miscellaneous I[edit]
Transcript[edit]We're indebted to a Florida Congressman Skip Bafalis for some news from the Social Security administration you might have missed. With all the talk about wage controls and the fight to lower the inflation rate, Social Security has made some interesting projections. For example, if we could get the inflation rate down four percent -- it's close to 10 percent now -- and if wages could be held to a five and three-fourths percent annual increase, our grandchildren will see by the year 2050 the average worker earning $656,000 a year. Now before you cut them out of your will as too rich to need any help from you, listen to the rest of Social Security's projections. A loaf of bread will cost $37.50, new cars will sell for around $281,000 and up, and if you step into a phone booth to call your wife to tell her you are on your way home, you'll drop $9.50 in the slot. The Congressman points out this is not some comic strip fantasy. It is exactly what will happen unless government starts now to spend only what it has. I'm sure anyone who lived in Germany between 1918 and 1923 will agree with Representative Bafalis. Another item makes me doubt that our government is earnestly making that 180 degree turn. The Labor department has announced that a federal job placement program cut public welfare payments by $400 million last year. But the program only costs $378 million. Incidentally, the recent 5.5 percent pay raise for federal workers means the average salary for federal civilian employees doubled in less than 10 years from $9,367 to $18,300. I wonder if they were included in that Social Security projection. On an entirely different subject, the American Petroleum Institute filed suit against the Environmental Protection Agency under the Freedom of Information Act. The Institute charged that the agency was suppressing a scientific study for fear it might be misinterpreted. Possibly you are aware that the E.P.A. has set ozone standards which industrial groups claim simply can't be met. Apparently, Industry is right. The suppressed study reveals that 80 percent of air pollution comes not from chimneys and auto exhaust pipes, but from plants and trees. Professor Patrick R. Zimmerman of Washington State University, a key scientist in the study, did careful research in the Tampa - St. Petersburg, Florida region. This is a relatively urbanized area, but even there he found that 68 percent of ozone-causing substances came from vegetation, and only 32 percent was man-made. It is his estimate that nationwide 80 percent of air pollution comes from natural sources. A spokesman for E.P.A. says the agency always intended making the report public and any misunderstanding was the fault of "misguided, mid-level employees." Maybe so, but let's have the truth before we spend umpteen more billions of dollars trying to solve an unsolvable problem. Or shall we cut down all the trees? This is Ronald Reagan. Thanks for listening. |
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