World 01_10_18
World 01_10_18 The World Barre-Montpelier, VT Your Health - Special Supplement
World 01_10_18
The World
Barre-Montpelier, VT
Your Health - Special Supplement
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Downsizing<br />
H1/2<br />
Around 1900, progressive dreamers wrote a series of<br />
Utopian novels, sharing their vision of a perfect Socialist<br />
future.<br />
One thing that they all had in common was communal living.<br />
In the perfect future, they assumed people would live<br />
together in large apartment complexes.<br />
Communal living is just rudimentary common sense. It<br />
saves lumber, brick, and steel. It saves electricity. It saves fuel<br />
because people are close to town and closer to work. It saves<br />
heating oil.<br />
Somewhere in the 20th Century, this efficient communal<br />
ideal was tossed in the garbage and was replaced by the ideal<br />
that a respectable American has to live in a house.<br />
Nothing, it seems, can shake the ideal of the single-family<br />
home.<br />
It has been proven that home ownership primarily benefits<br />
big banks, oil companies, IKEA, and Home Depot. It doesn’t<br />
make the people who live inside the houses happier - just more<br />
indebted.<br />
But check out any commercial during the playoff games<br />
this weekend. Whether they are selling Fabreze, Fritos, or<br />
Pharmaceuticals, the smiling Americans in the ads are all living<br />
in spacious single-family houses. It’s as if apartment<br />
dwellers or people who share their houses with renters are too<br />
poor or too uncivilized to even show on television.<br />
“Downsizing” shows us a 21st Century Utopia where<br />
almost everyone can afford to buy a house in cash.<br />
In writer/director Alexander Payne’s imaginative new<br />
world, people have the choice to undergo an irreversible procedure<br />
that reduces their size by approximately 99%.<br />
Living a new life at 5 inches tall is extremely appealing to<br />
two very different types of people: environmentalists who<br />
Central Vermont Chamber Supports Efforts that Recognize<br />
State’s Beauty and Culture<br />
The new year is upon us, and with<br />
it the return of the Vermont<br />
General Assembly to its second<br />
session of the biennial term. This<br />
means that once again the Central<br />
Vermont Chamber of Commerce, as an<br />
advocacy group, will represent the<br />
interests of Vermont’s business community.<br />
The Chamber works together<br />
with the Vermont Chamber, other local<br />
Chambers of Commerce, and various<br />
other business groups.<br />
The Chamber is a membership based organization, led by a<br />
very active Board of Directors. The Board has several committees<br />
that report to it, one of which is our Public Policy<br />
Committee. Our Public Policy Committee has met and spent<br />
several months reviewing and making changes to our Public<br />
Policy Positions. These positions, once adopted by the Board<br />
then become the official policy of The Chamber.<br />
During the coming session, The Chamber will once again<br />
be engaged with a number of issues and this week and next, I<br />
will be presenting those issues to you for your consideration.<br />
The Chamber recognizes that government has a responsibility<br />
to support and protect all citizens. The Chamber is<br />
cognizant of the fact that government has a direct role to play<br />
in creating a climate that is conducive to growing the economy<br />
Ṫhe Chamber has adopted the following policies in an<br />
effort to expand our economic profile, support our environment,<br />
and create jobs.<br />
Budget and Taxes: The Central VT Chamber supports policies<br />
that:<br />
• Promote economic growth<br />
• Do not disproportionately burden the business community<br />
or any one business sector<br />
• Limit state government growth to no more than the historic<br />
rates of annual inflation<br />
• Reduce corporate taxes to encourage private sector growth<br />
• Rely exclusively on property taxes to fund local government<br />
• • •<br />
• • •<br />
want to leave a smaller carbon footprint. And hedonists who<br />
want to enjoy all the finer things in life (diamonds, drugs, and<br />
mansions) for a fraction of the price of regular-sized people.<br />
Alexander Payne’s point is that people are eager to buy any<br />
product that makes them feel like they are saving the planet or<br />
keeping up with the Joneses. But they aren’t willing to do the<br />
one thing that will actually lead to environmental conservation<br />
and happiness: stop wanting more things.<br />
If Payne had nailed this point home and given us a few<br />
laughs along the way, “Downsizing” would have been an<br />
American classic. But he takes the film in a very different<br />
direction. “Downsizing” is full of surprises, but each surprise<br />
takes the story further off course.<br />
Matt Damon’s lead character is so boring and bland that<br />
you never care whether he finds himself.<br />
Matt Damon was once a great movie star with a cool sense<br />
of humor. Now he seems more and more like the dense marionette<br />
caricature version of him from “Team America: <strong>World</strong><br />
Police.” When Damon isn’t educating us about the difference<br />
between butt slapping and sexual assault (wow, thanks Matt!),<br />
he is making lousy movies. What was his last decent film?<br />
2006’s “The Departed” maybe?<br />
“Downsizing” is an over-long, unfocused bummer of a<br />
film. I haven’t felt this ripped off since that time that I foolishly<br />
bought a house.<br />
• Oppose the imposition or expansion of Local Option<br />
Taxes.<br />
Education and Funding: The Central VT Chamber supports<br />
policies that:<br />
• Return Vermont per-pupil spending to no more than 130<br />
percent of the national average<br />
• Reduce property taxes by increasing the pupil-to-teacher<br />
ratio<br />
• Provides students with the option of attending any elementary<br />
or secondary school<br />
• Promote efficiencies through consolidation.<br />
Employer/Business Mandates: The Central VT Chamber<br />
supports policies that:<br />
• Hold businesses and employer mandates to a minimum<br />
• Avoid additional paperwork and reports that consume precious<br />
time and resources<br />
• Encourage business expansion and job creation.<br />
Employment and Labor: The Central VT Chamber supports<br />
policies that:<br />
• Enable employers to maintain a safe and productive working<br />
environment<br />
• Support the rights of individuals to work without being<br />
compelled to join a union or compelled to pay for any part of<br />
the cost of union representation<br />
• Provide equal pay for equal work<br />
• Support visa programs that encourage temporary workers to<br />
legally seek employment in the United States.<br />
In order to create a climate that encourages business expansion<br />
and responsible growth, The Chamber supports efforts to<br />
grow our state that recognize the inherent beauty and culture<br />
that is Vermont. We believe that adoption of these policies<br />
will lead to greater economic growth, more business investment<br />
and the creation of new jobs.<br />
Next week, I will review The Chamber’s positions on<br />
energy, health care reform, permitting and transportation. I<br />
appreciate hearing your thoughts on our positions. Feel free to<br />
contact me via email at Bill@centralvt.com, or by phone at<br />
(802) 229-5711.<br />
HAVE YOU LEFT YOUR JOB? RETIRED? RETIRING?<br />
If so, you may have a variety of options available<br />
to you. We can educate you on your options<br />
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We have the experience to help you make<br />
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Give us a call today.<br />
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January <strong>10</strong>, 2<strong>01</strong>8 The WORLD page 11