Category: Social Conscience

Airlines and Profits

The headline of the small article in the L. A. Times business section caught my eye, “Airlines’ Profits Rise 64%.” The 64% profits referred to was from April through June of this year. They collected $900 million in bag fees and $753 in reservations change fees. Data on other fees charged passengers are apparently not being collected. While gas prices have held steady during that period, consolidation of air carriers by reducing competition is thought to have played a role in this spike. During the second quarter of 2014 airlines earned $3.6 billion in profits. For the same quarter in 2013 they earned $2.2 billion. Also in 2013 the nation’s largest airlines collected $3.3 billion in checked bag fees while in 2008 that figure was $1.1 billion.

It seems so obvious, the airlines’ profits are accrued at the expense of weary and burdened travelers. Most of us if we travel coach know that it is not fun to travel anymore. I wonder what it will take for travelers to say in the immortal words of Peter Finch’s character in the movie “Network”, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore,” because while profits can be said to be part of a healthy economy, excessive profits enter another category altogether—one we shouldn’t subsidize with our discomforts.

Waste of Time?

Not far from Orlando, Fla. The Villages is a retirement community where the draw is that you can live like a millionaire on a budget. There is free golf and affordable housing. Happy hours begin at 11am, there is of course everything a retirement community could need or want, and, relevant for some, even the possibility for unlimited sexual encounters. I shared reading the rather long article with one friend who commented, “My definition of hell”. I shared it with another who said, “Would be quite boring.” Yet the communities are growing, attracting people from several states including many retirees from the CIA. The article didn’t mention any resident leaving, but there must be those who become satiated with a hedonistic lifestyle after a while and want to go elsewhere. There are those who no doubt define happiness in shallow terms, for whom non-stop fun is a good life. I would surmise, however, that for the many retirement is not a second childhood and needs to have some meaning—more than likely a meaning that would take them beyond their own pleasure. That may be why I can’t help wondering how many think along with me, about the waste of time, efforts, resources and opportunities such retirement communities represent.

On Re-Homing

Re-Homing refers to the practice of adoptive parents who can no longer handle or want the children they adopted and advertise online for whoever will take them. Following an article a few months ago after a lengthy investigation by Reuters journalist Megan Twohey, child care advocates have asked the congress to do more to protect those children. Most are foreign born and have emotional or behavioral problems. Adoption agencies are not geared to handle post adoption problem leaving parents stranded as to what to do. They have gone online and Twohey found that at least one child a week is offered for adoption to whatever stranger is willing. In one instance she discovered the custody of a 10 year old boy had been transferred to a known pedophile—now in prison. As it stands the situation is an invitation to abusers, porn makers, traffickers and neither does it address the responsibility of adoptive parents who give their children to people they don’t know just because they say they would not mind having a problem child. Sen. Kay Hagan (Dem-N.C.) chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on Children and Families is looking into possible action or legislation. Let’s hope this is an issue where Congress can rise above its gridlock and partisanship. Meanwhile it becomes an example of positively using the powers of government to mitigate the lower aspects of human nature.

A Pet Called Paro

Some seniors are isolated with no visitors and with social contacts usually limited to nursing homes’ staff. Why not then have them be comforted by a robot disguised as a pet, in this case a furry animal called Paro? Some have Alzheimers’ and find it easy to relate to a pet, robot or not. The pet robot idea has also been tried with some children with autism and shown to be successful. To make their case, advocates ask, “Isn’t it better isolated people relate to a robot rather than stare at walls or television for hours?” Perhaps. Yet, I recall sitting on a bench at the beach near a group of seniors discussing what turned out to be soap opera characters as if they were members of their own families. And at the time I remember thinking, how sad. After reading about robots, I now question whether treating soap opera characters as family may not have advantages I hadn’t previously acknowledged. I grant there are instances such as those with some patients with Alzheimer’s or autism where using robots is clever and appropriate. But I am concerned that using robots with seniors in nursing homes may become the easy way out and keep us from looking at other solutions. For example, could some young people be given opportunities to volunteer? What about other seniors looking for meaningful activities. It takes work to recruit such people and even more to motivate them. But ultimately wouldn’t it build a better society?