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In reading your article on CFOs who are planning for retirement ("Are You Ready for Retirement?" August), I am reminded of the old adage about the shoemaker's children. It is embarrassing that so many sophisticated finance people are in such a situation.
Just to let you know that not all of us are like your examples, I am 55 years old and retiring at the end of this month in a planned handoff to my controller, now CFO. I will be sending my youngest of three children to a private college, just as I did his brothers, and am in the process of interviewing for a not-for-profit CFO position. (The job will mean a major pay cut, but will provide a great deal of satisfaction.) I also plan to travel with my wife of 28 years.
It can be done, but planning is crucial.
Joseph Lutes
Via E-mail
A six-figure annual education bill? Why in blazes do parents think they owe their kids a college education? Most of them won't even graduate, and those who do don't need to spend that kind of money on education anyway.
I had a couple come in this year for their tax return. Both were high-school teachers. I noticed that they didn't have any education expenses for their son, who was in his first year of college. The kid is paying for his education, just as his parents did. If he can afford $10,000 cars and "toys," he can afford $5,000 a year for tuition and books at his state college. He lives at home, but he pays for his education and toys.
My son earns around $10,000 a year working part-time in a restaurant. He is paying for his own college education (engineering at Fresno State). He received some scholarships and has the first two years paid.
And so I conclude: Why do parents impoverish themselves to pay for their kids' education? The kids can work and pay for it themselves. I did, and so did many others.
Jeff Carter
Via E-mail
The Toronto Space Needle?
Loved your story on U.S. firms taking their IPOs to our friendly neighbors in the north ("Going Public, Eh?" Newswatch, August). I'm guessing that the restaurant manager at Seattle's Space Needle really enjoyed getting a picture of his landmark building in the inset (as a stand-in for the CN Tower in Toronto?). It probably gave a boost to his Sunday brunch crowd as well. Maybe some friendly Vancouverites came south for some Yankee cooking!
Dennis Coffey
Controller
Northwest Cosmetics Labs LLC
Via E-mail
Editor's note: Indeed, the building pictured is the Space Needle and not the CN Tower. We regret the error, which more than one of our astute readers caught!
Of Woodpeckers and Programmers
After reading "Version Therapy" (Techwatch, June), the first thought to enter my mind was "Weinberg's Second Law: If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, the first woodpecker that came along would destroy civilization."
Mel Sher
Las Vegas
Not a Printer's Error
I run a commercial-printing company, and take issue with the idea expressed in "A License to Print Money?" (Newswatch, April) that printing firms are greedy and out to gouge clients.
Several times the article mentions the variation between the estimated costs and invoiced costs, while downplaying key ingredients in the price variations: alterations and tight deadlines. Estimates are just that — estimates — and they are subject to final review once a project is released. Although it should not happen, it is not uncommon for the released project to vary from the estimated project.
Large printing projects are run on equipment for which press runs are scheduled well in advance. A client's production slot must be kept at the forefront of all decisions so that every effort can be made to adhere to this schedule. No business will keep machinery that costs tens of millions of dollars idle while customer-caused delays hold up a project, and it is unreasonable to expect a printing company to do this and not be compensated.
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