You're fired!

I refer to Alexander Ludi's reply, Investors or retired people?, in The Jakarta Post on June 9 to my letter of May 21, Creating jobs to benefit RI.

It appears that Ludi has unfortunately completely missed the point. First of all, the thrust of my letter deals with creating additional jobs in Indonesia, where work is very badly needed as unemployment is still a very serious problem.

In fact, Malaysia has a very successful program called the "silver-haired program", which actively solicits retirees to live out the latter part of their lives in Malaysia contributing significantly to all sectors of the economy. Economists know that middle-class retirees have plenty of money and are useful for pumping money into economies.

At this point in time, Indonesia should be doing its utmost to attract all types of investment from retirees in factories. My letter of May 21 never favored one type of investment or another, but merely pointed out the possible benefits of additional investment.

Second, Ludi's financial analysis regarding what workers can repatriate does not take into account the huge taxes and cost of living expenses incurred in living abroad, so that in actual fact the money repatriated to Indonesia by workers in European countries is very low. Furthermore, it would appear that Ludi merely wants Indonesian workers who live abroad to have no life experience whatsoever, but merely to repatriate funds.

Ludi also negates the social and psychological cost of separating families from their loved ones. Separating families is no joke.

Last, I would have to say "No deal" to Ludi, as he should know that the first lesson in business is not to take things personally. So instead of "feeling insulted " he should come up with positive ideas to help Indonesia maximize its use of labor so that it can move from a third to first-world nation in as little time as possible.

Instead, having read Ludi's letter, the only words I have for him are: "You're fired!"

ROBERT ESKAPA, President Director, Izzi Pizza, Jakarta