Mountain Views News          Saturday, March 22, 2014

HOWARD Hays As I See It 
LEFT TURN / RIGHT TURN & MoreMountain Views-News Saturday, March 22, 2014 
8HOWARD Hays As I See It 
LEFT TURN / RIGHT TURN & MoreMountain Views-News Saturday, March 22, 2014 
8
Mountain 
Views 
News 
PUBLISHER/ EDITOR 
Susan Henderson 
CITY EDITOR 
Dean Lee 
EAST VALLEY EDITOR 
Joan Schmidt 
BUSINESS EDITOR 
LaQuetta Shamblee 
SENIOR COMMUNITY 
EDITOR 
Pat Birdsall 
SALES 
Patricia Colonello 
626-355-2737 
626-818-2698 
WEBMASTER 
John Aveny 
CONTRIBUTORS 
Chris Leclerc 
Bob Eklund 
Howard HaysPaul CarpenterStuart Tolchin 
Kim Clymer-KelleyChristopher NyergesPeter Dills 
Hail Hamilton 
Rich Johnson 
Merri Jill Finstrom 
Lori KoopRev. James SnyderTina Paul 
Mary CarneyKatie HopkinsDeanne Davis 
Despina ArouzmanGreg WelbornRenee Quenell 
Ben Show 
Sean KaydenMarc Garlett 
Mountain Views News 
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“What does labor want? 
We want more schoolhouses 
and less jails; more books 
and less arsenals; more 
learning and less vice; 
more leisure and less 
greed; more justice and less 
revenge; in fact, more of the 
opportunities to cultivateour better natures.”

 - Samuel Gompers, 1915 
Years ago, when I realized the rent still had 
to be paid while waiting for my break as an 
opinion columnist, I took a public-sector job 
that seemed an attractive prospect. For “fulltime” 
employees there were good health and 
retirement benefits, vacation and sick days, 
regular pay increases, etc. All it took to move 
from “casual” to “full-time” status was to stay 
on the job for a year.

 Several months into the job, I learned of 
another employment rule. When approaching 
the one-year hiring anniversary, employees 
were required to take a “break in service”; 
for one day they were removed from payroll, 
and the next day put back on as if a new hire. 
Employees would thus be kept on “casual” 
status for years on end, with none of the 
benefits of a “full-time” employee.

 Fortunately, we were represented by a union 

– and our union stepped in and helped put an 
end to that practice.
Years later, I worked for a manufacturing 
company whose biggest customer was one 
of the nation’s large retail chains. After 
becoming familiar with folks in the stores, I 
noticed many of their titles were changing; 
“Department Heads” became “Department 
Supervisors”, “Inventory Managers” were now 
“Inventory Controllers”. Employees would be 
re-started in “new” positions (doing basically 
the same jobs), with the revocation of whatever 
seniority, pay level and benefits they’d earned 
in their old ones. These employees didn’t have 
union protection, so if they wanted to keep 
their jobs, they pretty much had to take it.

 Especially with a declining percentage 
of Americans with union representation, 
employers feel more entitled to circumvent 
whatever worker protection rules there are – if 
not outright ignore them. And, they’ll have 
highly-paid front men at the U.S. Chamber of 
Commerce and American Enterprise Institute 
to concoct talking points to feed media shills 
and purchased Members of Congress.

Their latest comes with President Obama’s 
effort to stem the abuse of overtime rules, 
and the charge, repeated by Greg Welborn in 
his column last week, that this would “stifle 
upward mobility”. Thanks to the redistribution 
of the nation’s wealth to that upper 1% and 
concurrent decimation of the middle class, 
it’s already been stifled. Prospects for upward 
mobility here are lower than in most European 
countries.

 The president directed the Labor Department 
to reevaluate overtime regulations, as 
employers now are increasingly avoiding 
compliance by simply putting workers on 
salary with a new job title – getting more work 
for less pay, with more funds available for 
shareholder dividends and executive bonuses, 
rather than investments in their companies 
and workforce.

 The L.A. Times cites an Economic Policy 
Institute spokesman pointing out that a 
window washer spending 95% of his time 
washing windows, and another 5% overseeing 
a couple other window washers, could be 
reclassified as an “administrator” – and thus 
ineligible for overtime.

 One thing to be considered is the salary 
level, set some time ago, below which 
overtime is mandatory – currently $455 a 
week, sub-poverty-level for a family of four. 
Betsey Stevenson of the White House Council 
of Economic Advisors notes that if that level 
were simply adjusted for inflation, 3.1 million 
Americans would qualify for overtime. As it is 
now, someone making less than $25,000 a year 
can be forced to put in 60-hour weeks with no 
additional pay – as long as they’re given an 
impressive job title.

We’ve been hearing the same “job-killer” 
arguments in regards to raising the minimum 
wage. They were heard fifteen years ago in the 
State of Washington, when voters approved 
increasing theirs and tying it to inflation so 
that now, at $9.32 an hour, it’s the highest 
in the nation. Job creation in Washington 
(0.8%) now beats the national average (0.5%). 
Payrolls in Washington’s restaurants and bars, 
businesses highly affected by labor costs, have 
expanded by 21%.

 New Seattle Mayor Ed Murray hopes to 
raise it locally to $15 an hour. As he put it, 
“We can’t rebuild this economy if it’s just 
people who buy 94-foot yachts and play in 
the derivatives. You build an economy when 
a middle class is buying microwaves or flat-
screen TVs or the next set of clothes for their 
kids.” 

Last November, New Jersey’s voters hiked 
their minimum wage a buck to $8.25 an hour, 
with future increases tied to the Consumer 
Price Index. In January, the month the law 
took effect, employers added over eight 
thousand jobs – the fastest rate of job growth 
in New Jersey in over a year.

 The CBO figures President Obama’s 
proposal to raise the federal minimum wage to 
$10.10 an hour over time in three steps would 
cost 500,000 jobs, a 0.3% cut in employment. 
At the same time, though, 900,000 Americans 
would be lifted out of poverty, and the $31 
billion gained by low-wage workers would 
be pumped back into the economy, not 
sequestered in some offshore tax shelter.

 It’s also reported that this minimum wage 
hike would cut food stamp costs by 6%, saving 
us $4.6 billion a year.

 Bloomberg reports that last year U.S. 
corporations parked over $200 billion in 
profits overseas, bringing the total close to $2 
trillion outside the reach of the IRS. The group 
Good Jobs First finds that, over the past twenty 
years, state and local governments have doled 
out $63 billion to Fortune 500 companies (not 
small start-ups and entrepreneurs). The Koch 
Brothers alone have taken in $88 million in 
corporate welfare.

 These are the folks spending millions to 
keep the poor from getting healthcare, to cut 
food stamps and unemployment insurance, to 
avoid paying decent wages that would allow 
more Americans “opportunities to cultivate 
our better natures” – something that can’t be 
achieved by simply handing out an impressive 
new job title.

PUTIN TAKES GREG Welborn 
CENTER STAGE 


Business Trends 
FAMILY MATTERS By Marc Garlett 


ANOTHER ACTOR’S ESTATE PLAN SCREWED 
UP BY HIS LAWYER 

Oscar-winning actor Philip Seymour Hoffman’s will was recently filed for probate and 
provides a cautionary tale for all of us when it comes to estate planning mistakes. 

Here are four things Hoffman’s lawyer could – and should – have done differently to 
correct them: 
Create a Revocable Living Trust. Hoffman was a public figure who valued his privacy. Yet 
by creating a will instead of a revocable living trust, he let the world in on his private life. 
We now all know that his son will inherit everything at age 30 and we’ll also know the 
total size of his estate when it’s inventoried and filed with the Court, as it must be. A will 
is public record, so every detail is available to anyone interested enough to look it up. A 
revocable living trust would have allowed Hoffman to keep his private wishes private and 
his son’s inheritance his son’s business, instead of everybody else’s. 

Update your plan. Hoffman created his will in 2004 but never updated it, so his two 
youngest daughters are not mentioned or provided for in the will. His estate has been 
valued at $35 million, and his executor is his long-time companion who is also the mother 
of their three children. After born children are provided for by law, but Hoffman lost out 
on the opportunity to specifically direct their interests. 

Cover your assets. While Hoffman did create a trust for his son Cooper, naming 
Cooper’s mother as sole trustee, that trust will dissolve once Cooper turns 30. And all 
assets distribute to Cooper outright at that time. Instead, Hoffman could have created 
a Lifetime Asset Protection Trust that would have kept Cooper’s inheritance safe from 
divorce, creditors, lawsuits and bankruptcy forever PLUS provided incentives to Cooper 
to grow the assets of the trust rather than squander them. 

Use tax-saving strategies in your estate plan. Since Hoffman was not married to his 
long-time companion, there will be a monster sized estate tax bill to pay, both state and 
federal. The use of other tax-advantaged estate planning strategies like an Irrevocable Life 
Insurance Trust (ILIT) would have preserved assets and resulted in much more money 
going to Hoffman’s family and much less to the US Government. 

To put the proper protections in place for your family, contact our office to schedule a 
time for us to sit down and talk. Because this planning is so important, I’ve made space 
for the next two people who mention this article to have a complete planning session at 
no charge. Call 626.355.4000 today and mention this article, or visit www.GarlettLaw.com 
for more information. 


SIERRA MADRE FARMERS 
MARKET


 The Sierra Madre Farmer’s Market hours have changed 
to 3:00pm through 7:00pm every Wednesday. Vendors include 
Dry Dock which has fresh and wild caught fish, Rustic 
Loaf with artisan breads, Cutie Pie with fresh pies and much 
more! 

For those interested in being a vendor contact Melissa 

Farwell with Raw Inspirations at 818-591-8161 ext. 806. 

 There are many who believe that 
recent events in the Ukraine and 
elsewhere in the world have damaged 
President Obama’s stature and 
credibility. While there is much truth 
in those observations, we should pay 
closer attention to who has risen to 
replace Obama as the world’s most 
important political leader. The 
significance of Obama’s humiliation 
here pales in comparison to the effect 
Putin’s ascendency will have on the 
world order.

 First, there are the obvious affects 
which stem from a weak American 
President and weak America. 
Members of Obama’s inner circle have 
mockingly accused Putin of being 
too “19th Century” assuming that he 
and every other rogue in the world 
see that as a slur. The Putins, Bin 
Ladens, Assads, Khomenis and Kims 
of the world see it as a compliment. 
The rhythm of history has very 
consistently been one of the powerful 
and determined taking what they 
want from the weak and complacent. 
The relative peace and calm of the post 
WWII era was a break with that longer 
historical reality because America 
remained strong and enforced a civil 
world order.

 America is now irrelevant in terms 
of enforcing any measure of civility or 
minimal morality upon the world’s 
thugs. There have been absolutely 
no meaningful consequences to the 
annexation of Crimea, the gassing 
of innocent Syrian children or the 
pursuit of an Iranian atomic bomb. 
Expect such actions to multiply. Any 
despot who covets any territory lying 
adjacent to his existing border will 
simply take what he pleases, which 
of course is very 19th Century, but it 
is also very profitable. There will be 
more instability, not less; more deathand destruction, not less.

 But this is only the beginning. 
The worst outcome from Putin’s 
ascendency and dominance on 
the world stage will be nuclear 
proliferation. This is somewhat 
ironic given President Obama’s stated 
desire to reduce the presence of 
nuclear weapons, but it is nonetheless 
predictable. It is the primary lesson to 
be drawn from Crimea’s annexation.

 Few people realize that when the old 
Soviet Union broke apart, a significant 
portion of their nuclear weapons 
were stationed in the Ukraine. Since 
the Ukraine became an independent 
country, it had the right to keep those 
weapons residing in its territory. 

This was not in the 
world’s or Russia’s 
interests, and so the 
new Russia struck a 
deal with Ukraine: 
voluntarily give 
up your nukes and 
Russia will promise not to violate 
Ukrainian sovereignty or territory. 
Not entirely trusting Russian integrity, 
the Ukrainians asked that the United 
States and Britain add their assurances 
in what became the 1994 Budapest 
Memorandum. The deal called on us 
and the Brits to provide the muscle 
necessary to keep the Ruskies honest.

 The only problem with this is that 
nothing kept us or the Brits honest. 
Neither country has even broken a 
sweat in trying to defend Ukrainian 
territory. The question becomes – and 
it’s being asked by every other small 
vulnerable government on this planet 

– what would Russia have done had 
the Ukraine still possessed nuclear 
weapons? Does anyone believe that 
Russia would have risked a nuclear 
confrontation in order to take the 
Crimean peninsula? The obvious 
answer is no. And therein lies the real 
danger. 
Japan and South Korea are surely 
considering the benefit of replacing 
their reliance on U.S. resolve and 
promises with reliance on a couple of 
nuclear missiles that could be hurled at 
any attacker. The same goes for Egypt, 
given the threat posed by a nuclear 
Iran, and for a host of other countries 
still nursing historical grievances with 
their neighbors.

 The deterrent affect offered by nuclear 
weapons is a strong one, and it’s only 
natural that it now be considered in 
a more positive light. The calculus of 
the world order has changed. The U.S. 
is no longer a reliable defense partner 
or keeper of the peace. It is every man 
– or country –for itself.

 Once again, a man who campaigned 
so affectively on the benefits of 
fundamental change, to the cheers 
of a worldwide audience, has now 
been forced off that stage and leaves 
it different than anyone would have 
guessed and certainly worse than 
anyone would have wanted.
About the author: Gregory J. 
Welborn is a freelance writer and has 
spoken to several civic and religious 
organizations on cultural and moral 
issues. He lives in the Los Angeles 
area with his wife and 3 children and 
is active in the community. He can be 
reached gregwelborn2@gmail.com 

IT ALL ADDS UP 
As you search and tour homes that appeal to you, how can you be sure that 
the asking prices are in line with current values? Begin by asking your 
real estate agent to collect comparables and prepare a Comparative Market 
Analysis (CMA). This report indicates market trends by showing whether 
similar homes in the area are selling for above or below the asking price of 
the home(s) you've selected. 

Using the comparables that your agent researched, you'll be able to figure 
the average cost per square foot for the area, and determine if the home 
you want compares favorably with those figures. Total the square footage 
of several homes and divide by the number of homes to get an average. 
Total the "sold" prices of each home and divide by the number of homes to 
get an average selling price. 

Now, divide that average selling price by the average square footage to produce 
the average price per square foot for homes in the area. When you 
multiply that average price per square foot by the square footage of the 
home you want, you'll discover how your choice compares, and then you'll 
know if you're looking at a fair price. 

Other factors like the seller's motivation or urgency may also affect your 
offer, so talk to your agent about that CMA and take the next step!