Like many people, Jeff Bigler has confused the terms “minimum wage” and “living wage,” using them synonymously in his letter (“Minimum wage should be $22 today,” Star-Advertiser, May 1).

Minimum wage is what government requires me to pay new, inexperienced teens, who are seldom worth half the required $10.10. At $22, I’d never hire another one again.

Living wage is what experienced adults and families feel they need to live on, which is a complex issue between individual employees and their employers, certainly not the government’s job to force upon either party.

I support Bigler’s suggestion that employees strike or take other wage actions against their employers. But keep the government out of it.

Who has the right to force me to pay $22 or $122?

John Corboy

Mililani

Small pay raises can’t keep up with prices

When I began working, in a laundry, at age 15, minimum wage was $1.05, but since I was just part-time, I got 90 cents. Other, better jobs followed, and, always, news of even a small raise was greeted with joy.

Always, though, soon after, I would find that I still could only afford to treat my children to a McDonald’s meal, or a movie, once a week. And because wages had risen, the price of every single item at the grocer’s or pharmacy was higher.

Then would come the rise in our longtime apartment rent, “because,” my kind and truly apologetic landlord said, “the handyman wants more money, and water bills are going up … ”

I think every hardworking person deserves a salary that will allow him or her to live safely and to raise healthy, well-fed keiki. But this is not going to happen unless a wage hike is combined with a price freeze.

Gloria McCulley

Makiki

A multimillion-dollar bridge for the wealthy

Why is the state building a multi- million-dollar bridge across Ala Moana Boulevard to provide access to Ala Moana Regional Park and beach to residents living in their multimillion-dollar condos?

The state should invest our hard-earned tax dollars on desalination projects to replenish our precious water.

William “Dutch” Kay Jr.

Kailua

Don’t be fooled: We don’t have lots of water

Despite crowding Oahu far past its reasonable capacity, we’ve been fortunate to have had fairly ample supply of fresh water up to now, thanks mainly to orographic lifting of moist air over our mountains which condenses, falls as rain and recharges our aquifers. If protected from contaminants, it’s the best water in the world.

Whether it’s from natural Earth cycles and/or human-induced, climate change is real. Many parts of our globe are getting hotter and drier.

For parched Las Vegas, with four inches average annual rainfall and Lake Mead showing a white “bathtub ring” 170 feet high, it would take 510 years to refill to that former level. The feed from the fast-shrinking Colorado River won’t help much either. We are heading toward a similar crisis.

So please conserve water, whether you think you’ve got plenty or not. You don’t. And please help fund companies developing better desalinization technologies.

Dave Akers

Waialae-Kahala

Recognize service of government workers

Public Service Recognition Week, which has been celebrated since 1985, is May 1-7, 2022. It honors those who serve our nation as federal, state, city and county government employees.

Whether a mechanic repairing a leaky valve on a submarine berth in Pearl Harbor, or an emergency medical technician tending to a kupuna in back of an ambulance, they go about their jobs with care and deliberation, and with a willingness to serve.

We are blessed to have such fine people among us.

John Priolo

President, Hawaii State Federation of the National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association

Pearl City

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