Word: leveller
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1980-1989
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Instead of waging war solely at the City Council level, real estate interests decided to sponsor Proposition 1-2-3. By shifting the focus away from rent control, the industry hoped to dupe large numbers of Cambridge residents. And by turning the debate city-wide, landlords planned on capitalizing on its one advantage--access to money for a large-scale campaign...
...current tax system discriminates against capital gains in one way: it ignores inflation. If a stock has doubled during a time when the general price level has also doubled, the real profit is zero, but you'll pay a capital- gains tax anyway when you sell. Of course, the same is true of interest -- an 8% return on a money-market fund at a time of 5% inflation is really only 3% -- but no one is proposing to do anything about that. Furthermore, no one is proposing to limit the deduction for interest paid. In a world with no taxes...
Some people collect Victorian hatpins. Others accumulate matchbooks. Mel Poretz, 60, is a compulsive collector of useless information. He knows exactly how many steps there are in his Merrick, N.Y., split-level home (21). As a child he knew how many stars surrounded the mountain peak in the Paramount Pictures logo (26 originally, now just 22). And like many people who are happy in their jobs, he has found a way to put his obsession to work...
Tongue-in-cheek humor also lifts Freddy's Nightmares above the jolt-'em-out- of-their-seats level of its theatrical namesakes. Freddy (Robert Englund) can still be one ruthless customer: in the season opener, he sliced off a woman's head, which plopped to the floor like a ripe pineapple. Most weeks, however, he serves merely as the wisecracking narrator for unrelated stories revolving around dreams. Many are unexpectedly lighthearted; a few even approach satire. In one of last season's entries, a yuppie career woman had a thirtysomething nightmare about having a baby: her boss replaced...
...interests, one hopes with taste and grace. We probably could not change them if we wanted to. It is worth noting that each of the four former Presidents has reverted to form with a vengeance. Reagan is back on the mashed-potato circuit (raised to a world-class level), taking fat fees for propounding his doctrine of hope and reward. Carter, who always was a better missionary than a President, now has the stature and the means to tread the globe's troubled pathways relentlessly urging reform and righteousness...