Retiree can't bear District 301 tax bill
I am requesting a reduction of my school taxes via my county property taxes for the following reasons:
1. This year's school tax was $6,370. This is 70 percent of my property taxes.
2. Since 1995, I have paid $56,000 to the school system.
3. We have never had a child in any District 301 school.
4. We have been retired since 2003, and our income is now one-third of our working income.
Is it the goal of District 301 to drive us out of our house? How about some relief with our school taxes?
I do not want to hear how District 301 improves my property's value. And, yes, I get the senior tax discount of $210.
Orrin Cassata
Hampshire
Must look honestly at medical payouts
I'm writing in response to Richard Rohlfing's Aug. 31 letter and to everyone else who supports socializing our health-care system.
Ask any historian if socialism has worked anywhere it has been tried and the answer is "no."
Now on to Rohlfing's statements on Medicare. First, he says you can go without the insurance, which is true, but who would do that after age 65? Then he says you can keep your private insurance, which is absolutely false. No private insurance is primary for anybody over 65 years old, and for the retired, it is only secondary to Medicare. That's a fact.
He's correct that you can turn your Medicare benefits over to an HMO for it to "manage," which means you lose access to most doctors and hospitals for the purpose of controlling costs. In essence, you're getting rationing of care.
The problem with health-care costs is a direct result of the government creating the Medicare system during the 1960s. Doctors and hospitals abused the system by driving their costs up because Uncle Sam was paying. Prices soared out of sight, so in the early 1980s, the federal government stepped in and initiated price controls still used today. When you couple price controls, which have never worked, with millions of illegal immigrants getting free care in our hospitals, the cost of care must be shifted somewhere. Here it's shifted to younger people on private insurance, and premiums are increased to cover the difference.
Despite the price controls Medicare imposes and the $93.50 premium all seniors pay each month, Medicare has been billions of dollars in the red each and every year for over 20 years. The government covers the Medicare losses with income taxes from working people.
Yes, I'm a licensed insurance broker making an honest living and paying a lot of income taxes to the government to prop up failed programs like Medicaid, welfare and national education, and to keep Social Security and Medicare solvent.
Rolfing should respect that fact and appreciate what working Americans are paying into these systems.
More socialized medicine will not drive down costs, but will cause rationing of care, as it has done all over the world.
Terry L. Gavin
Elgin
ICE actions on Arellano laudable
Congratulations to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency for the recent deportation of Elvira Arellano. Arellano had been claiming sanctuary in a Chicago church for the past year and recently was arrested in Los Angeles.
The crimes that Arellano committed include entering the U.S. illegally, disobeying deportation orders and using a stolen Social Security card. The churches that sheltered her and the corrupt employers who hired her should be in trouble with the law.
Paul Carrozzo
Algonquin