* As Charles Hurt explains, this freeze only affects a portion of the total federal workforce; it does not cut the size of the federal government (“Obama’s Freezing Forecast,” Nov. 30).

This action took two long years, and it was made in response to a citizen revolt against federal spending.

Now, President Obama is gaming the Democrats’ loss of the House by proposing this modest freeze, although he found it easier to affect the fixed income of seniors two years in a row.

This chameleon-like behavior is Obama’s forte. When push comes to shove, government employees and big labor unions will get one of his famous waivers.

Theodore Miraldi

The Bronx

* Does anyone know how the president can save us billions of dollars by freezing government wages?

That is just an amazing bit of arithmetic that must be taught at Harvard; having attended Wharton, I was taught that savings were only achieved as a result of reductions in costs.

Our president is using an old and tired expression of “savings.”

Let’s get real and reduce costs now, before the Treasury drives the dollar down even further.

A. Scolaro

Tequesta, Fla.

* I wonder how many federal employees will quit and attempt to join the private sector as a result of Obama freezing salaries. My guess is zero.

If freezing federal salaries is saving $2 billion from the deficit, cutting 10 or 20 percent of salaries would surely save even more money.

All federal salaries should be continually cut until many of those workers quit to join the private sector. Only then will we get back to the nation our Founders envisioned — a small federal government with limited power.

Matthew Nugent

Staten Island

* Freezing the pay of federal employees is not the answer.

I haven’t received an increase in my annuity for two years, and my mom hasn’t received a Social Security increase, either. I am working because I can’t live on my retirement alone.

Take all the foreign aid to countries that do not like us, and give it to unemployed, hard-working Americans, disabled veterans and Social Security recipients.

Jose Romero
Allentown, Pa.

* As always, the problem is that the freeze affects only the little people, not members of Congress or their staff.

I don’t understand how such a recommendation can be made with a straight face.

I guess the president has not gotten the message from the voters in the recent election. We all have to share the pain.

George Coppola

Whippany, NJ