Ken Needs Schooling in Visitor Industry!
I was stunned by Ken Schoolland's column (SB NEWS March 1997) "Government Funding of Tourism? Ha!"
His premise is that taxpayers should not be asked to pay for tourism promotion.
Ken needs to be shown that tourists are responsible for more than $1 billion of Hawaii's annual tax revenue, that at least 175,000 residents of Hawaii would be collecting unemployment comp and other benefits (and not paying taxes) if tourism collapses.
Governments all over this and every nation in the world spend prodigiously to advertise and market their visitor attractions. In fact, nearly all spend from four to 12 times more than Hawaii on either a per visitor or per room basis.
Destination advertising is vital. The hotels, resorts, and commercial visitor attractions already do as much product advertising as they can afford. Government is the largest single beneficiary, yet spends less than 2 percent of its revenue from tourists on tourism marketing.
Our legislature has always been shamefully niggardly when it comes to spending money to promote any of our products or visitor attractions.
The reason is simple: Politicians find it to their personal advantage to spend your tax money on a bloated and non-productive government workforce.
How would Ken Schoolland like to be paying far more taxes in order to support the government employee unions?
That's exactly what he'd be doing if the $1 billion handed over to the tax collector by tourists came to a halt.
Newt Notes SBH
I wanted to write and commend your leadership in the taxpayers movement. Your support for the Taxpayer Protection Pledge, sent to all federal candidates for Congress, brings home to all candidates that they must tell voters where they stand on the key issue of tax increases.
I took the Taxpayer Protection Pledge back in 1986 and urge all candidates for Congress to stand with taxpayers and take the pledge.
The state level taxpayer protection pledge for state legislators will highlight the tax issue in all state races as well.
Again, thank you for your leadership in the struggle against higher taxes and for limited government.
There are several advantages of running your business with a Macintosh compatible computer. Some of these are:
Ease of Use: The hallmark of the Macintosh operating system (OS) is its legendary "ease of use." The learning curve is not very steep for anyone who wants to use a Mac. Basic skills can be mastered in about an hour. The Mac's simple to use graphical interface is credited for this ease.
Setting up and using a peripheral device on a Macintosh takes about 10 minutes to half an hour at the most. There usually is no complicated configuration file to set-up.
Connectivity and Compatibility: Macs can easily share files with those of PC users. Most of the popular word processing, spreadsheet, database and publishing programs have the capability to swap files back and forth between Macs and PCs. Newer programs published for both platforms usually make this task seamless. Mac and PC files can be shared by swapping discs, over local area networks or across the internet. All Macs built since 1990 can read, write and format to PC discs.
Business Software for the Mac: There are many business software titles for the Macintosh. The popular ones include:
* Word Processing: Microsoft Word and Corel WordPerfect, well known PC apps.
* Business Productivity: Microsoft Excel, Claris Filemaker Pro, Intuit's Quicken, Mac In Tax, M.Y.O.B., Panorama, Now-Up-To-date/Contact, MS Office suite.
* Compatibility: Soft Windows or PC Compatibility Cards offer users a way to run Windows software on their Macintoshes.
* Internet: Adobe Pagemill, Macromedia Shockwave, Netscape Navigator, MS Internet Explorer and others allow publishing and connectivity to the internet.
This is only the tip of the iceberg. The Mac is a very capable computer and contrary to what you hear, will be around for a very long time. If you want to know more about Macintoshes give me a call at 946-2676 or drop me an e-mail.
CALLING FOR SBH MEMBER WEBPAGES: With more than 50 million people worldwide on the internet, it is quite inevitable that some of our members have a presence on the worldwide web. I am compiling a list of member websites for inclusion and review in upcoming columns. If you would like your website to be published, please send me your URL by e-mail at macpro@lava.net or call 946-2676.