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2g ------ - yp pie Oa gauRl " . y > i a ----.] 4 -- PORT PERRY STAR -- Tuesday, March 29, 1988 Editorial Comments What Price Prosperity? These are supposed to be the good times, right? In Ontario, the economy is booming, the unemployment lev- els is somewhere under four per cent, consumer sales for everything from cars to stereos have never been healthier, new homes, shopping malls and factories are going up like mushrooms, even that nasty old chestnut-the inflation rate- is at an acceptable level of about five per cent. And closer to home in Durham Region, more of the same. Last year was unprecedented in Durham in terms of growth. In fact, the assessment base climbed by a very healthy 8.6 per cent.. There are real signs of affluence eve- rywhere you look. Jobs are going begging. Just check the want ad column of this paper or any other paper and see for yourself. Yes sir, to live in good old Ontario these days is to be living pretty close to paradise.. Unemployment is someth- ing for our poor cousins in Newfoundland to worry about. And if you can't find work in Alberta, come on home to On- tario and take your pick. OK, we are stretching things slightly. But let's be honest, the economy of Ontario, especially the golden horseshoe that rings Metro on three sides, has performed exceptional- ly well in the last few years. But there may be some danger signs on the horizon. Ontario treasurer Robert Nixon was not very happy last week when a report appeared from the Dominion Bond Rating Service which painted a potentially grim economic picture in this province, if the economy should suddenly take a dip. The Service suggested that Ontario could see its annu- al deficit triple to a whopping $6 billion if there is a sudden down-turn, something which could be a reality if the United States is hit by a recession as some are predicting. The reason, says the rating service, though hotly de- nied by Mr. Nixon, is that the provincial government has not - made many in-roads in trimming its spending while the economy has been in full bloom. And there have been some strong hints that when next month's provincial budget is handed down, Ontarians will be hit with some further tax increases. Here in Durham Region, the Regional government has brought down a budget (as yet not approved) that will in- crease spending by 19.6 per cent over last year. Now, revenues and subsidies are going up by a slightly higher rate, and the 8.6 per cent growth in assessment re- duces the net impact on the average property owner to a fairly comfortable 7.3 per cent. But the fact remains that in the middle of a very prosperous time economically, Re- gional government spending is on the way up by double digit quantities. The tax-payers who foot the bill, will hardly notice the 7.3 per cent jump in the Regional share of their taxes this year. But once that increase gets built into a bud- get, it's hard to get rid of it. What happens next year, if the economy sours, and people are counting their dollars a (Turn to page 8) Port Perry STAR 235 QUEEN STREET - PORT PERRY, ONTARIO Phone 985-7383 P.0.Box90 LOB 1NO J. PETER HVIDSTEN Publisher Advertising Manager Member of the Canadian Community Newspaper Association and Ontario Community Newspaper Association. Published every Tuesday by the Port Perry Star Co. Ltd., Port Perry, Ontario J.B. McCLELLAND Editor Authorized as second class mail by the Post Office Department, Ottawa, and for cash payment of postage in cash CATHY OLLIFFE News & Features Second Class Mail Registration Number 0265 1985 AAAI nao! OMMUN Subscription Rate: In Canada $20.00 per year. Elsewhere $60.00 per year. Single Copy 50° © COPYRIGHT -- All layout and composition of advertisements produced by the adver- tising department of the Port Perry Star Company Limited are protected under copyright and may not be reproduced without the written permission of the publisher. HIGH-TECH, ol' Boy! WE LAY Er) HAND-PAINTED / A Gulp! Jim SURPLUS LABOR! Chatterbox by Cathy Olliffe IT'S NOT WHAT YOU THINK Wednesday March 23, 9:30 a.m. Today marks the seventh 24 hour period since | licked my lips, placed a cigarette be- tween them at a rakish angle, and lit it up. Seven days since I've had even a puff. And | don't really miss it. | don't. Honest. And while | haven't made any big deal lifelong committment to never smoking again (lI probably will, who knows, who cares) | think I'll be staying away from the weed for a long time. It wasn't a big decision for me to quit. I'd been sort of thinking about it recently, ever since I've had trouble falling asleep at night because of coughing spasms. And I'd get fun- little pains in my chest, and I'd think vaguely n of cancer and wonder if | should quit or what. | mean, it really wasn't a heavy pressing thing. 1 liked smoking. And liking it still out- weighed all the reasons there are for quitting-- at least in my head. So | continued to smoke, thinking every once in a while that maybe, someday, | should give it up. And then | got sick, and couldn't smoke for a couple of days. And since I'd already not smoked for two days, | figured, what the heck, now's a good time to quit. So | did. It's been seven days, and I'm really no harder to live with than | ever was. My teeth aren't wearing stinky little sweaters in the morning, I'm not coughing as much, and my hair smells fresher, longer. | can go places without my purse, because | only used my purse to carry smokes. | feel free, and kinda proud, like | just got a pixie cut at the barber shop. So if | feel so darn good about quitting, why do | feel so bad? Physical cravings? Nah, I've hardly had any. | feel bad, because | feel like I'm giving in. Feel like! | have given in. I've given in to the obnoxious holy-roller anti-smoking crusaders who are cutting the throats of tobacco farmers and smashing the rights of smokers, especial- ly in Toronto, where smoking in the workplace is now a bigger sin than impaired driving. Always rebellious by nature, | fairly seeth whenever anybody starts telling me what | can or cannot do. And I've been doing more than my fair share of seething in the past three years, ever since smokers became the bane of civilized yuppie society. Cigarette companies might as well be selling heroin for all the respect they get. Wacko re- ligious cults advertise. Booze pushers adver- tise. Hookers advertise. | mean, even the gov- ernment is allowed to advertise. But the big, had fire-breathing smoke companies can't. Go igure. And then, the same money-grubbing gov- ernments that openly steal our hard-earned wages under the guise of taxation--the same governments that tax cigarettes to death--are trying to force people to stop smoking, by making all workplaces, shopping places, any kind of places--smoke-free. The governments, of course, are led by the nose by these anti-smoking crusaders who preach the gospel of second-hand smoke dangers, cancer, Plague, all the sickeningly healthful garbage they throw at all of us all the time. They're so goodie-two-shoes, | wanna barf. Yeah, yeah, yan, so smoking's bad for ya. So the holy-rollers got a point. So what. Just because they're right doesn't mean they're not reptilean human beings. So you see what | mean, eh? By quitting stioking, | feel like I've given in to the other side. But | haven't, see. | didn't give in to anybody's pressure. | just realized smoking was making me feel bad, so | decided to quit. That's all. And if any shiny- eyed health nut says anything to me about seeing the light, I'll find the stinkiest stogie | can and blow smoke in his face. | really hate how society dictates how we should run our lives. These days ya gotta be skinny, smoke-free, and upwardly mobile to be fashionable. Fashionable. Isn't that a crock. In the 1950's, smoking was fashionable. Can you believe it? The same people who are holy-rollers now were lighting up their Lucky's in their peddle- pushers 30 years ago. Why do we have to be so caught up with fashion anyways? Why are we so concerned with what the rest of the world thinks of us? Why can't we just live our own lives indepen- dently, doing what we think is right, without worrying about whether or not we're caught up with the Jones's. As long as we're not hurting anybody else, what difference does it make? Actually, it could probably make a lot of dif- ference. There's a lot of stodgy closed minds in this world, in this community, that wouldn't' Xow a fresh idea if it hit them square in the ace. Stalwart coots. Somebody should light them up a Lucky. It might help.