Shaq and Wooden: How Do You Measure Worth?

Want to know what’s wrong with this country? Someone like Shaquille O’Neal getting $88.4 million over a three-year period for throwing a ball through a hoop. That works out to $3,364 an hour, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, which, of course, Shaq doesn’t work. Meanwhile, the shoes he wears, the ball he uses and probably his uniform, are manufactured in China, where the average monthly worker salary is $30. As a consequence American workers are out of a job, or employed at minimum wage. But even well paid workers can hardly afford the price of a ticket Jerry Buss charges to see his center at work.

FRED BAUMAN

Riverside

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The sports page of Saturday noted that Shaq will earn $32.4 million in 2005-06. In the same section, it noted that the most John Wooden earned was $38,000 coaching the UCLA Bruins. The business section covers the efforts by Nike to “keeping its brand fresh to kids . . . “ When a society has those values, it suggests decay. When youngsters are more aware of the shoes they wear than the books they read, the federal Social Security program is really in trouble.

ROY A. FASSEL

Los Angeles

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I admire and respect Shaquille O’Neal for his skill as a basketball player and his apparent decency as a human being, but $88.4 million is a preposterous amount to be paid for just playing a game. A teacher making $50,000 a year (more than most earn) would have to work more than 1,760 years to receive the equivalent amount. Does this say something about our American values?

DONNA ENGBERTSON

Riverside