A gentleman from Fort Wayne died last month. The cancer caught up to him just a few days before his 80th birthday. Like many
of us native Hoosiers, this fellow was born of working folks. His dad was a traveling hardware salesman,
his mom a homemaker.
I read with interest IBJ’s [June 29 story] focusing on health care reform. I was not surprised by the exclusion
of opinions from “real” private-practice physicians.
The challenges facing Indianapolis Public Schools are daunting. The socioeconomic level of its students and their families,
fiscal constraints, and a necessary heightened focus on security issues are just a few, but all contribute to high dropout
rates, low academic achievement, achievement gaps between middle-class and low-income children and declining enrollment.
“Most people hate to pay taxes,” Gregory Goad said. “They don’t appreciate the services taxes support,
they don’t understand why taxes are necessary, or they don’t like to help people in need.”
Hard drives fail—almost all of them, at one point or another. Back-ups are a little clunky to set up
and keep up with, so most people I know ignore it. I finally decided I couldn’t avoid it any longer.
I entered "Tutankhamun: The Golden King and the Great Pharoahs" (at the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis through Oct. 25) with a limited knowledge of Egyptian history—and by limited, I mean loose threads picked up from a handful of Mummy movies, the Bible, and a few too many productions of "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat."
It would be artless this week to write an article on economics and business in Indiana without remarking upon the passing of John Fisher. Much has been written about his legacy over this past week, so I will make do with an anecdote and a lesson I have learned from him.
When prominent Egyptologist Zahi Hawass shared stories at a recent event about his personal meeting with President Obama,
my pride was momentarily dashed by the behavior of the people sitting at the next table.
When Hawass noted how impressed he was with our new president, these people became incredulous. They started snickering like
schoolchildren.
While transparency is a stated goal of many corporations, deliberations regarding distribution of shareholder property
to executives are not subject to light of day or to review. Instead, decision-making is camouflaged by
thousands of words that appear substantial but disclose little.
In the not-too-distant past, Microsoft was the most dominant company on the planet. In 25 years, it had spawned the world’s
richest man along with products that became as ubiquitous as water.
I own and manage a small business. WellPoint is our health insurance carrier. I have an employee, makes good money. He is in excellent health but he is diabetic. WellPoint won’t insure him!
As both House Speaker Pat Bauer, D-South Bend, and House Republican Leader Brian Bosma, R-Indianapolis, see it, this is definitely a "Republican-flavored" budget. Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels laid the framework, and legislators from both sides of the aisle largely abided by his bottom lines of spending, state agency cuts and surplus.
[In his June 22 column, Bruce Hetrick asked,] "Is global citizenship ‘intellectual nonsense and stunningly dangerous?’" This question, reflective of Newt Gingrich’s recent statement declaring himself not "a citizen of the world" elicited personal incredulousness.
The legislative session that concluded June 30 with passage of a two-year budget left a bad taste in our mouths. For starters,
legislators lacked the courage to tackle local government reform—even though cash-strapped units of government
desperately need the millions of dollars in savings they would generate. In short, they put political cronyism ahead of the
interests of the state.
Search the Web for Naisa and you may come up with the North American International Auto Show or the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association. Neither has anything to do with the new Naisa Pan-Asian Cafe (1025 Virginia Ave., 602-3708), where the name comes from simply reversing the letters in the word Asian.
If we are lucky, by the time you read these words the Indiana General Assembly will have passed a new budget. Democrats use
tarot cards and Republicans chicken innards to determine how much to spend. There are alternatives.
One of just three Maker’s Mark restaurants in the country—the others are in Louisville, Ky., and Kansas City,
Mo.—the upscale eatery would have been a good fit in downtown Indianapolis or in one of the suburban dining-and-shopping
meccas.
Target-date mutual funds, a popular investment vehicle in 401(k) plans and college savings plans, have recently come under
scrutiny by Congress and regulators. Investors are in an uproar over the recent poor performance of funds nearing their target
date.
The folks who control executive compensation are often executives themselves. Boards must realize that their self-dealing,
self-benefiting ways are grossly out of line with the true value of one’s contribution to a business and society.
Here’s why some leaders are able to get so much more out of their teams than others.
