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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 12, 1983)
Portland Observer, October 12, 1983 Page 5 MEN S ACCESSORIES TIES •5,° - •T" - •8M - $10 - $12*° Washington Hot Line by Congressman Hon Wyden COTTONS BLENDS - DACRON NEW FALL COLORS Saving Medicare dollars without plundering seniors The title o f this article describes an ideal. Most people’s response to it is "nice trick, if you can pull it o ff." That is understandable given the history of the last three years. The Reagan Adm inistration has gone about cutting billions of dol lars in social expenditures essentially by cutting benefits; the theory being that the only way to save money is to take away benefits. That is a conclusion which I re fuse to accept. And, based on its ac tions today, it is one which the House Energy and Commerce Com mittee's Subcommittee on Health and the Environment also does not accept. E arlier this summer, I wrote about my efforts to help save Medi care dollars by cutting out waste in the system. Included in that package are my bills which would: 1) Save $300 million a year by es tablishing a national fee schedule for laboratory services performed for Medicare recipients; 2) Save $30 million a year by elim inating payments for nunecessary foot care services for Medicare pa tients, and 3) Save $27 million by ending exces sive m onitoring on cardiac pace makers implanted in Medicare pa tients. I can happily report that these measures have been accepted by the Health and Environment Subcom mittee o f the House Energy and Commerce Com mittee o f which I am a member. These subcommittees' actions are the im portant first step in getting these reforms into law. There are still other hurdles on the way to making these ideas into real re forms, but they carry with them a compelling argument: They account for more than $350 million worth of the required $400 million in savings targeted by the budget resolution passed earlier this year. Most im portantly, these savings are achieved without cutting bene fits to recipients of Medicare or dig ging deeper into the already bare pockets of senior citizens. I strongly believe that this is the kind of innovative waste cutting ne cessary to keep the Medicare system and other government programs working well without drowning the government in a sea or red ink. Howard study probes Black families by Henry Duvall Stable middle-class Black Amer ican families today may look like they've "made it,” but, according to a 50-family study at Howard U ni versity, they face economic and em ployment problems and a significant percentage of their children are de pressed . In a recent study on stable Black families in metropolitan Washing ton, D .C ., researchers at How ard U niversity's M ental H ealth Re search and Development Center found that financial, m arital and child problems head the list of prob lems most frequently experienced by stable middle-class Black families. Job dissatisfaction was reported high in their assessments o f their lives. And a surprising finding o f the study is that one-third o f the fam ilies noted that their children suffer from depression. The problems most frequently re ported by married men in the study were marital (65.4 percent), finan cial (61.5 percent) and children (53.8 percent), followed by health (34.6 percent) and job/em ploym ent and friends (each cited bv 26.9 percent of the male respondents). The married women cited prob lems they frequently experienced as financial (65.4 percent), marital and children (each cited by 53.8 percent o f the respondents), and jo b /e m ployment (30.8 percent). More than three-quarters o f the single women heading households named financial problems (83.3 per cent) on the top o f their list, fo l lowed by m arital or m ale-fem ale problems (75.0 percent), children (54.2 percent), and job/employment (41.7 percent). Financial, marital and child prob lems are problems faced by most middle-class families today regard less o f race, says D r. Shirley H a t chett, a sociologist at the University o f M ichigan’ s Institute for Social Research. Middle-class Blacks are perhaps more vulnerable to changes in the economy than white middle- class families because, for the most part, they are "newly arrived” mid dle-class people, she adds The study focused on 50 stable Black families in the Washington, D C ., area who were nominated by com m unity organizations. The Washington metropolitan area has one o f the highest proportions of middle-class Black families in the nation. Seventy-six individual interviews were conducted with 26 wives and their husbands, as well as with 24 single women who head households. One strict criterion of stability was that the family unit be at least five years old. Many of the families in the study were above the median income, education and employment levels in comparison to other Black and white fsm ilies. M ore than 90 per cent of the couples and almost half the single women own their homes. The study’s principal researcher, Dr. Lawrence E. Gary, director of Howard's Institute for Urban A f fairs and Research, which houses the mental health research center, believes that many of these families experience financial problems be cause expenses virtually consume their incomes. Many o f them send their children to private schools, or are paying for day care, as well as mortgages. For the most part, they have only their incomes to rely on because they have little or no finan cial reserves. Gary also attributes the problem to the high cost of living in the na tion's capital, and to social pro grams that practically give no breaks to the middle class in favor of assistance to low-income people. He says that financial planning counseling may be needed. On the employment fron t, Gary believes that many of the persons in the study are dissatisfied with their jobs because there is "an awful lot o f (w hite) resentm ent” o f Blacks making gains He says a large num ber of educated Blacks are underem ployed, and are not moving up the ladder the way they should, which leads to job dissatisfaction. Further, he notes that Black fe males face “ a double whammy” — sex and racial discrimination. The m arital problems cited by husbands and wives in the study were linked to five areas of disagree ment in their marriages— household expenses, housekeeping chores, dis ciplining children, how to spend lei sure time, and irritatin g personal habits. "Problems with in-laws, re ligion, relatives and plans for the two o f them were seldom c ite d ," says the report. Seventy-five percent of the single women in the study, most of whom were divorced or separated, are ex periencing male-female problems. Most of these problems are tied to experiences they are having with former mates, says Gary. They have difficulty getting child support and there are problems with visitation rights. The most frequent problems re lated to children were depression and unhappiness. One-third o f the parents reported child depression. The single mothers, 62.5 percent of them, saw this as a problem compared to 53.9 percent o f the married mothers. One source o f the depression, says Gary, may be that the children are frustrated over the absence of their parents in the home becuase they are working. Lula A. Beatty, project director, speculates that the cause o f the de pression may be that the children at various times have come under pres sure to achieve because their parents are high achievers. And for those children in single-parent house holds, the depression may be a t tributed to the disruption arising from the break-up of their parents. "The reason for the speculation is because we did not anticipate this,” she says, noting that a study of the problems of Black children and ado lescents is being planned. O ther aspects o f stable Black fam ily life were also found in the comprehensive study. Family unity, religion and love were perceived by the families as their strengths. In analyzing life satisfaction, the study reveals that men were more satisfied than women on all dimen- Efforts increase to defeat racist employment/immigration bill by Ramon Ramirez By government decree, October 10th is celebrated as Columbus Day. We. representing Oregon’s Mexican and Hispanic com m unities, com memorate October IOth as "D ia de la Raza." or Mexican Heritage Day. This year, Dia de la Raza holds spe cial significance in light of recent de velopments in our campaign to de feat the Simpson-Mazzoli " Im m i gration Reform and Control A ct." Last week. House Speaker T ip O 'Neil declared that Simpson-Maz zoli was dead for 1983, and prob ably dead for 1984 as well. He went on to promise that no immigration legislation would reach the House floor unless the Hispanic Congres sional Caucus supports it. The Hispanic Caucus strongly op poses Simpson-Mazzoli, especially the provisions to create employer sanctions; these sanctions involve fines and ja il sentences for hiring undocumented workers. It supports the Caucus' position and feels that the Speaker's recognition of the im portance of that position was long i overdue. In our opinion, however, Simp son-M azzoli is not dead, not for 1983 or 1984. Congressional staff tell us that an October 18th House Rules Committee meeting, previous ly set for the purpose of hearing tes timony on limiting the full House's debate and amendment of Simpson- Mazzoli, will proceed as scheduled Senator Byrd threatens to attach Simpson-Mazzoli to some “ urgent” piece of legislation, perhaps an ap propriations b ill./o rrm g the House to vote on Simpson-Mazzoli. Senate leaders are reported to be "consid ering" this approach. We therefore are increasing our efforts to defeat Simpson-Mazzoli. As we have consistently stated, we oppose the provisions of Simpson- Mazzoli because: • The proposed employer sanc tions will only serve to increase ra cism against non-whites seeking em ployment. • The "leg alization ” provisions will create a huge "guest-w orker” program, denying workers the bene fits their tax dollars fund. • Cutbacks in due process protec tions for asylum applicants are un acceptable. People who have fled torture and hardships deserve full legal rights. These cutbacks w ill most seriously affect Haitians, Sal vadorans and Guatemalans. • The proposed expansion of the "temporary worker” or " H -2 ” pro gram increases the forms o f legal ized slavery, as seen during the Bra- cero program terminated in 1964. This legislation is ill-considered and backward. I f passed, it will ce ment an anti-latino and anti-im m i grant bias in U.S. immigration law and policy for generations to come. Organizations endorsing the above opinions include: Centro Chi cano Cultural (Woodburn), Centro C ultural (Cornelius), Coalition fo r Im m ig ran t and Refugee Rights (P o rtla n d —statewide), Hispanic P olitical Action Committee (P o rt la n d -s ta te w id e ), IM A G E (P o rt land— statewide). La Alianza Legal de Oregon (Portland), Mujeres de Oregon (Portland—statewide), Wil lamette Valley Immigration Project (Woodburn). sions, and m arried women were more satisfied than were single women on all dimensions except for those who face, in addition to their careers, everyday routines of chores such as cooking and housekeeping. " A ll groups agreed on the source of most satisfaction— family life— and the source o f least satisfac tio n -jo b s .” The profile also shows that stable Black families solve their own prob lems. I f help is sought, they turn to relatives or friends rather than insti tutional sources. The researchers recommended in the study that the church, especially the Black church, undertake pro grams that seek to im prove the "economic via b ility ” of families The Black church has tended to fo cus attention on the adult and not the fam ily. "T h e re 's a big d iffe r en ce," G ary stresses, noting that this is a recent phenomenon. 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