Letter: There is no such thing as a free lunch

Posted 12/17/24

To the editor:

While I agree with your editorial (A more equitable solution: Dec. 11, 2024) that the Town’s favoring one non-profit or private entity over others is problematic, there are …

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Letter: There is no such thing as a free lunch

Posted

To the editor:

While I agree with your editorial (A more equitable solution: Dec. 11, 2024) that the Town’s favoring one non-profit or private entity over others is problematic, there are actually larger issues. The federal pandemic bailouts obviously went way overboard and beyond necessity. They resulted in a nearly 10 percent inflation rate due to the pouring of excess money into the financial system, which in turn contributed to the election loss of Kamala Harris. 

In addition, the fact that communities such as Barrington are scratching around at the last minute for a place to offload the funds, indicates that it should never have been received in the first place. Or perhaps communities with greater basic needs should have gotten our share.  

Finally the ARPA money is anything but “free.” Much of the funds were dissipated by the bureaucratic administrative costs inherent in the giveaway. Furthermore none of the money was on hand or readily collectible, therefore it was, as are too many of federal expenditures, borrowed. This increases the national debt and the interest accumulates eventually outstripping the principal itself. So the $106,000 or so granted to the YMCA will become thousands more for our children and grandchildren to pay off. And on and on it will go until the interest on all our borrowing will be so large we will have little left for essential services. 

There is no such thing as a free lunch and there is no “free money” either. 

Stephen E. Glinick

Barrington

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