Seattle just another Detroit?
“Washington has one of the nation’s better business climates” [“Here’s what to watch around here next year,” Business, Jon Talton column, Dec. 20]? Compared to whom, the old Soviet Union? Come on, dispense of the bull. You can go to many other states that have more favorable climates to conduct business activity than Washington.
Lower standard of living in South Carolina [“The right companies will come along,” Opinion, Northwest Voices, Dec. 16]? You’ve got to be kidding.
I live in South King County. We just had another fatal shooting here involving a police officer and a domestic-violence suspect. These types of confrontations are becoming commonplace, as we also had a Des Moines police officer shot and killed along Highway 99 during the past decade.
If you live in this area then you would realize most of South and Southwest King County is overpopulated and crime infested.
As a friend of mine said, most of Seattle and the metro area is slowly becoming like another Detroit. Yes, I agree bringing in McDonnell Douglas was a serious mistake and the Machinists union lives in a liberal fantasy world of days gone by. However, just calling crime and unemployment a problem that most big cities share is avoiding the issue. It’s poor management and a lack of legal willpower.
Sweeping our problems under the carpet and pretending the whole state is like Bellevue and the Eastside is sadly a common perception, in both Seattle and Olympia.
— Craig West, Des Moines
Which middle class do union workers support?
There have been several articles recently about our state’s labor and labor unions [“Boeing and the Machinists: a missed opportunity,” Opinion, Dan Jacoby guest commentary, Dec. 18].
More than 60 percent of the workers in the state are nonunion, and money is tight. This would be a great time to have our tax dollars spent on nonunion workers to build our roads, schools and state buildings.
The union bosses or stanch union members say they want to keep wages up to support the middle class. Now if you ask them who redid the roof of their house, or who did their concrete driveway, they will say that they got a nonunion contractor to do the job. The nonunion contractor did a great job at a good price.
The only middle-class people the union workers want to support are themselves, at the expense of the taxpayers.
— Larry Worden, Auburn