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Bankers' nightmares

Re Austerity and monetary policy are out of steam. We need a new Marshall Plan (July 29):

Louis-Philippe Rochon explains that more austerity and monetary expansion cannot stimulate economies caught in the grip of deflation. He recommends massive fiscal expansion by the G20.

Such co-ordinated reform is a start, but governmental budgets are already constrained by decades of accumulated debt. Added spending will build more debt.

CIBC has estimated that boomers 65 and over will inherit $750-billion. That bounty could go toward reducing Canadians' $1.9-trillion in household debt. The wave of millennials, who already number more than the remaining boomers, may replenish declining government income taxes.

These factors may help, but other countries may not be so fortunate. A new Nobel laureate in economic sciences may be needed to deal with universal debt and deflation.

- Norm Stefnitz, Burlington, Ont.

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Prof. Rochon's suggestion of a single currency is particularly problematic. A single currency is the source of most of the European Union's economic policy issues. Countries bound to the euro and its accompanying bureaucratic mess are unable to devalue their own currencies – this forced Greece to accept the very austerity measures Prof. Rochon argues against. Imagine such an issue magnified worldwide. Better yet, imagine how a commission tasked with managing a single global currency could exist. Would it look like a financial United Nations? That is the stuff bankers and investors have nightmares about.

Better to manage globalization and free trade by expanding and strengthening the social safety net. This would support the workers that lost out on globalization while maintaining free trade.

- Sergio Montanez, Calgary

So much left to do

Re It's 2016, but women still earn less (July 30)

I was happy to see The Globe highlight pay inequities between men and women that continue to persist. The piece seems to imply that government has solved its pay-equity problem, but government agencies continue to fail women.

I could point to many examples, but here's one: Legal Aid Ontario was recently taken to Ontario's Pay Equity Commission by female lawyers for its failure to comply with the province's pay equity laws.

We've come a long way, but there is still so much work left to do to achieve women's equality. I'm committed to working for it, but political leaders must also take an active role.

- Scott Travers, president, the Society of Energy Professionals, Toronto

#dadjoke

Re Most Water Tests Deemed Safe After Saskatchewan Oil Spill (Aug. 4):

It's reassuring that the tests are safe, but what about the water?

- Don Douglas, Vancouver

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