I would like to thank Derek Gordon for his letter 'My rates have doubled but my income hasn't” in your paper 20/8/10. He has clearly highlighted a major problem but not only with our Council's Rates.
I am not an apologist for Council profligate spending nor the free market functions that have brought the growing disparity between incomes of different ranges. Continuing with this misguided mathematical function is something that is potentially unsustainable if not addressed effectively soon.
Derek Gordon like the majority of us will find that the widening gap in incomes must eventually prevent more and more people from participating in the market place to an extent that is not only desirable but necessary.
This is happening now with all those at the bottom of the income scale and with many undesirable effects that are loudly condemned and at increasing taxpayer costs. Markets themselves will fail when enough people cannot afford to participate.
The present market place rash of discounting sales is an indication that the time could be with us now where a change in forward thinking is needed to not only keep the market place itself afloat as we have known it but to change the unsustainable market function that brought us to this point, the revolving percentage-plus markup over time that results in this unsustainable compounding of costs.
D.L.Reid. Tauranga.