Business letters

Regarding the story, "Neighborhood face-lift gives Hollywood pause," (May 6):

What amazes me more than anything is the consistent lack of mention of a population's ability to afford all of this development. Certainly a walkable neighborhood is desirable, but every development I have seen with those types of features requires you to make a healthy six-figure income to be able to reasonably afford it.

Yet that is the assumption being made to support all of these developments. How many luxury apartment complexes and condo communities can we really support? The current housing debacle demonstrates far fewer than developers would ever admit.

Jeff Magill,

Group Finance Manager

City National Bank,

Los Angeles

Let's share cost of health insurance

Except for the healthy and the wealthy, the rest of us -- not just employers -- are being pinched, if not strangled, by rising healthcare costs. ("Healthcare costs pinch employers," May 7.)

People with supposedly excellent insurance are forced to declare bankruptcy because of out-of-pocket expenses from major illness. We lose high paying jobs to Canada, Britain and Europe, where companies can provide quality products and services without the expense of healthcare.

If the U.S. were to have national health insurance, we could provide quality that no other country has accomplished while achieving similar cost savings.

The challenge is not to make for-profit health insurance affordable for employers but to establish public financing for national health insurance.

Jerry Frankel

Plano, Texas

Yahoo shows money isn't all

I am not defending Jerry Yang in his recent debacle, but what is so disturbing is the trend over the last two decades of the cart leading the horse. ("Yahoo’s Yang in hot water," May 7.)

Many companies like Yahoo are built by entrepreneurs who use their skills and passion to create a great product. They eventually sell out for the big bucks only to realize later that their vision is no longer part of the picture.

The company is now being challenged by individuals who have no passion or concern for the product, but rather a greedy desire to cash in, even if it means diluting the vision. Somewhere along the way we will eventually realize that it isn't always about money.

Bernard Lax

Los Angeles