Readers Write (Feb. 29): Workforce, labor unions, gas prices

The highly skilled workforce that employers say they want is available now ("Wanted: A highly skilled workforce," editorial, Feb. 27). But academic training for older workers is not enough to match employers with the best-qualified labor.

For workers over 40 who already have degrees, certificates, and 10 or more years of experience, further academic training offers little help. These "overqualified" job seekers are losing out to younger, less-experienced candidates because employers, often enough, expect to pay them less.

Academic training is also of limited value to midlife career-changers. First, there is the opportunity cost. When a homeowner goes back to school, financial aid designed for college students doesn't pay the mortgage.

Second, a new certificate is no substitute for the "three to five years of proven, direct experience" that employers typically demand and that job seekers are counseled to gain through volunteering. Members of the "sandwich generation" cannot forego income for years at a time, support their parents and children, and still save enough for retirement.

More than 43 percent of unemployed workers older than 55 have been out of work for a year or longer, reports the Pew Memorial Trust. Wanted: employers willing to invest in seasoned professionals. Remember, you get what you pay for.

LOU ANN MATOSSIAN, MINNEAPOLIS

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• The Star Tribune Editorial Board opines on Feb. 19 that a right-to-work referendum "would put Minnesota on a new and risky path. That's a risk legislators should not invite voters to take."

• Star Tribune reporter Jim Ragsdale ("GOP weighs costs of union battle," Feb. 26) reports that a full debate on right-to-work "could lead to the kinds of protests and energized union voters that have made Wisconsin ground zero for labor activism."

• AFSCME Minnesota Executive Director Elliot Seide is reported to have said that organized labor is gearing up to fight back and that labor demonstrations could turn the State Capitol into another center of Midwestern union activism. He has stated: "They would bring Wisconsin, Ohio and Indiana here to Minnesota."

Unions in Minnesota, both private and public, are legally empowered to require workers to pay union dues. Not commonly reported is the persistent impression that union members' best interests are too frequently secondary to the compensation and political influence peddling of union bosses.

Media and union representatives appear to be forewarning "we the people in the precincts." That is, it seems that we are being told that we had better lay off and, furthermore, forget about an opportunity to vote upon a right-to-work amendment.

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Brent Magid's Feb. 26 article defending the possible "right to work" amendment was understandable, though less than credible. The company for which he is CEO makes money, as its website states, by maximizing the profits of its business clients. One might conclude that weakening unions is part of its mission statement.

If you want real-time evidence of what maximizing profits entails, you need only turn to the business section of the same paper ("Delta's use of temps worries full-timers").

When Delta bought Northwest Airlines in 2008, the workers voted to abolish their union. This allowed Delta to bring in temps, with no benefits, to fill jobs. As the percentage of temps increases, full-time workers are feeling threatened, and there is now an ongoing effort to reinstate the union.

JOHN EVANS, MINNEAPOLIS

There is controversy over cables or guardrails in the center of divided highways and over whether cheap-tax America is unwilling to pay the price. If we pay the price and install the systems on all divided highways, the next question would be: What to do with the millions of miles of two-lane roads? These are much more dangerous, with cars meeting at 55 miles per hour and only feet separating them.

BRUCE A. GRANGER, PRIOR LAKE

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Word has it that gas prices will be going as high as $5 a gallon come summer. Yes, this is outrageous, yet employers insist that their full-time employees commute five days a week. Years ago, I thought the technological advances and the creativity of movers and shakers would render the drive into work obsolete.

With teleconferencing, Skype and the ever-ingenious ways of using the Internet, why are people still going into work every day? Not every industry can be flexible, but corporations should think outside the box and realize the direct or indirect savings that a new initiative might have on their bottom lines.

SHARON E. CARLSON, ANDOVER

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Newt Gingrich said recently that when President Obama took office, gas was $1.89 a gallon, and that Obama bears full responsibility for the increase since then.

When Obama took office, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was about 8,000. Today it is about 13,000. Does Obama bear full responsibility for this, too?