<p><strong>To the editor:</strong></p>
<p>Free market enterprise has a fabled ring of purity, given the premise that all Americans have equal chances to achieve affluence and, therefore, a comfortable standard of living. This promise portrayed as obtainable through diligence, perseverance and hard work is a falsehood and full of insincerity.</p>
<p>In our American predicament, the successful quest for prosperity is hinged to favoritism, nepotism, government subsidies for business and tax shelters that entice companies to locate in our areas.</p>
<p>The system that protects the business community first and gives little security to the employee is a flawed one. The climate that perpetuates trickle-down economics is a rigged system favoring business interests over the worker’s.</p>
<p>We, who do not aspire to live via survival of the fittest techniques or simple lust for money as a means in itself, cannot condone the corporate greed and shareholder protection mentality that dominates our political and social landscape today.</p>
<p>Because the American worker provides the fuel that drives the engines of our economy, his plight requires attention first. Any system that fails doing this must be adjusted into compliance. Low and/or static wages, high-deductible and high-premium health care if provided at all, and loss of bargaining rights contribute to the unfair worker treatment in play today. Our once-great middle class needs and deserves mending. We may begin by voting for Democrats this November.</p>
<p><p style="text-align: right"><strong>John B. Baker</strong></p>
<p><p style="text-align: right"><strong>Bargersville</strong></p>
