Mr. Know-It-All

                              

I am starting a brand-new feature for 2018, an occasional question-and-answer column to provide needed answers to pressing questions. Now, since it is just beginning, I  had to find some really good questions, and there was no time pressure on me to come up with the answers.

How did I do it? I listened to people while waiting on line at my local big box store and the little deli a couple of blocks away. I grabbed a question or two from a talk radio station - I won’t say which one - that was asked just before the host called the caller an “idiot” and hung up on her.

And, of course, I made some of them up.

Let us begin. You can provide a fanfare yourself.

Dear Mr. Know-It-All:

My boss sent out a memo saying that, because of the new tax laws, we would all be getting a pay raise. Anyone with stock in the company would be getting a 30% increase in their purchase options.

But while our boss will make about $12,000 on the deal this year. I don’t have any stock options. Neither do the other people I work with every day. The boss says that while he would love to give us some money, it would violate our contract and he could be sued. 

The contract runs for another three years, and my boss says the company will be really generous next time we negotiate because the nation’s economy will be so much better.

My question is, what do I do when they ask me to work overtime now. I am afraid I will lose my second job if I don’t show up.

Dear Overworked:

I feel your problem. I really do. My answer depends on how much overtime you work, how much you make, and whether you can afford to say no and risk losing your job, which I assume is your main source of income.

If you don’t need the overtime pay, have solid job security and don’t want to work overtime, you should tell your boss you will be more than happy to work all the overtime he assigns, anytime after a new contract is signed three years from now.

Meanwhile, I suggest you start looking around for another job that might actually pay a little more than you now make, or pay a little less but give you a big bonus of self-respect.

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Dear Mr. Know-It-All:

I have an uncle who takes Amtrak several times a year, and I am worried because of the recent accident in Washington state, as well as accidents in New Jersey and other places.

Now I know Congress is investigating the cause of the accident, and why there was no smart technology in place to control the speed of that train going around a curve. I know it exists. Congress demanded that it be put in place years ago.

Do you think they will get to the bottom of this tragedy? Will anyone get arrested and punished for those poor people who were killed?

Dear Worrier:

You are right in everything you say. Congress is on the job. The technology is available and could have been installed. Congress did demand the job be done.

The sticking point - at least according to my sources - is that while Congress voted to make Amtrak safer, its members never got around to voting for the money to do the job. And, as far as I know, no contractor would agree to do the work with only the promise that they would get paid when the economy gets a little better.

You will know when the Congressional investigation is getting close to the truth when the appropriate committees buy some mirrors.

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Dear Mr. Know-It-All:

I know that my Republican party has done some bad things in the past few years, and that in the year since Donald Trump has gotten into office, things in Washington are becoming a little, well, tacky.

But, he is saying some things that need to be said and that I agree with. More to the point, I am making money on my investments, and if the tax burden gets too big, I will just move to some state where they don’t have high taxes or big expensive cities. The fly-over country covers a lot more space than the east and west coasts do, and I am sure I can find a happy home someplace where the buffalo used to roam.

Do you see any flaw in my logic?

Dear Flawless:

Let me answer this question in reverse order. I’ll save the biggest problem for last.

First (or last, as the case may be) you may find yourself alone on a great plain someday, in desperate need of a good doctor. Or accountant. Or lawyer. The really good ones - trust me on this - really don’t have a lot of time to waste, and their practices are pretty well filled up.

You could always go to a clinic 80 or 90 miles away if there is no snowstorm or forest fire, and you could always hang around the county courthouse and hope some lawyer trips at your feet. Good luck with that.

Next (it works either forward or backward), our President is calling out a lot of people - the poor, minorities, Democrats), but any good showman knows that you have to vary the act. In a couple of years, all his old favorites may be gone, and he will need new ones to pick on. How is your ethnic heritage, background and experience? And how many times have you played golf at a Trump course? These things will count.

Now, finally, we have the problem with your money. It’s a good problem, of course. Having money always is.

People make money on bad things all the time. Otherwise no one could buy alcohol or crack, or rent prostitutes. We erase the moral distinction between people who own stock in an electric utility that uses coal plants or a food company that pushes corn syrup and sugar, and the people who own stock in a bank that sells mortgages to people who will never repay it and then forecloses on the house and sells it again.

You are not bad because you own stock in an arms manufacturer, you are - maybe - just no worse than someone who speeds through a red light or takes 12 items to the line that says “10 or less.” We live in a flexible moral world.

But the point is that, while you are making money now, you are probably making it because the people under you on the economic ladder are losing money. And the national debt is getting bigger every year (It’s how the tax code works).

If we keep shoveling money up the economic ladder, pretty soon you will find out that the line that divides you from the poor people on the lower rungs has quietly slipped from beneath your feet and is now above your head.

And you won’t be able to use bonds to cover the debt any more and pass it on to your kids,  because there are just too many people under 35 in the voting pool and they now outvote you. Just don’t depend on the kindness of strangers, especially the ones you meet in the health clinic 100 miles from your house.

Address your questions to Mr. Know-It-All at Where’s Walter C? at blogspot.com. Who knows what answers we will find together.