Growing

The 20th century's noble experiment in agricultural production has been the collective farm as developed and practiced in the Peoples' Republic of China and the former Soviet Union. It didn't work.At the same time, we in Maryland have operated one agricultural industry, oyster production, primarily as a large collective farm. It hasn't worked here either. At least in China, Russia and Ukraine, unlike Maryland, government policy has recognized the failure and encouraged private ownership and operation of farms.

Reflecting the upheaval swirling under the surface of the growing U.S. economy, a new survey showed yesterday that major American employers announced 37,486 layoffs in March, an increase of 11 percent from the month before.The survey came in sharp contrast to a federal government report Friday that the nation's employers added a higher-than- expected 140,000 jobs last month despite a 17-day strike against General Motors Corp.March's heavy layoff and job-creation figures, analysts said, reflect the two sides of a job market in which major companies continue to restructure and cut staff even as the economy as a whole grows at a solid rate.

So here we are at the beginning of a new year, trying to remember todate and sign things with 1992, and perhaps looking back to the yearjust gone by. What did we do right? What could we have done better? And what did we just plain screw up? Which led me to look at some of the issues I commented on over the past year.I discussed items such as pizza wars in the county, where competition became fierce with all kinds of special deals, and the fact that we still have no BurgerKings in the county.

First Mariner Bancorp Chairman Edwin F. Hale Sr. recently posed a question to the company's board of directors: Should the bank slow down and concentrate on making money or should it keep growing at break-neck speed?The decision? Keep growing."One hundred percent of our board has voted to take a real run at this opportunity right now and open more locations," Hale said yesterday after the company's annual meeting at the Sparrows Point Country Club in Dundalk."The type of growth that we have had has been extraordinary."

The major challenge currently facing Aberdeen is that of selecting a City Council that will truly represent the people and act responsibly on behalf of the people. We have seen two years of the force of the "politics of vested interest" fighting for dominance over the City Council. This is a malevolent disease which has all the signs of becoming a chronic illness. . . .Apart from this challenge, which, I believe, will determine the future of Aberdeen for the next few years, the city will be tested on various issues:We have a growing drug problem in two areas of the city.

Tessco Technologies Inc., a rapidly growing seller of equipment to the wireless telecommunications industry, has decided to stay in Maryland after flirting with a possible move out of state.The company said yesterday that it has bought a former General Instruments Corp. building in Hunt Valley and will use it to consolidate its headquarters and distribution operations under one roof. Tessco now has its headquarters in Sparks and two distribution facilities in smaller Hunt Valley quarters.

FRISCO, Texas -- When Max Bledsoe was growing up on a farm here a quarter-century ago, this was a tiny railroad town of 2,000, far removed from the bustle of cosmopolitan Dallas, 30 miles to the south across the flat North Texas plains. Now, as a health teacher and softball coach at Frisco High School, Bledsoe works for a school district with more employees than the town once had residents. It serves an exploding exurb of 82,000, where the rush of new roads and shops has almost caught up to the booming population.

PASADENA, Calif. - As a child growing up in New Jersey, Bryant McKinnie wasn't allowed to play with his friends on organized football teams. He was simply too big. So McKinnie played basketball and kept growing. "When I was 10, I wore a size 10 [shoe]," said McKinnie. "All the way to when I was 18 [I was growing], and then it stopped." As for his eating habits, McKinnie said his mother used to buy six boxes of cereal at a time and had to hide all but one in fear that her growing son might devour them all in one sitting.

WASHINGTON -- In the latest sign of the public's hunger for a political outsider in the White House, a new national survey has found that a complete non-candidate, retired Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, commands nearly as much voter power as presidential contender Ross Perot.The poll by the Times Mirror Center for the People and the Press similarly shows that Americans are so fed up with traditional politicians and the institutions of Washington that they are willing to take a giant risk in this election year -- to sacrifice experience and ignore constitutional safeguards if it means strong leadership and change.

America faces many deficits -- in federal and state budgets, in trade, in business and, most assuredly, in personal finance. But there is one very large deficit that may underlie all of them. We face a "posterity deficit," born out of our growing failure to think about the well-being of future generations. Most people are not much concerned with what lies ahead for the world beyond their lifetimes. Yet, decisions we make today on questions like the environment and spending will have far-ranging implications on the lives of future generations -- for better or worse.