We are rapidly losing our middle class, a fact that wasn't an interest of mine until I became of victim of corporate greed.

I begin noticing that here in Omaha the new neighborhoods are offering $150k homes and up, prices that are beyond the reach of the mainstream. The vast majority of Nebraskans live in the outlying areas, or small towns, in very modest homes. They drive older vehicles. Their lifestyles are distinctly less affluent, an econmic contast that was not nearly so extreme in past generations.

One cause of this diaproportionate distribution of wealth is this country's glorification of education, combined with the aforementioned greed factor.

CEOs demand an obscene income, in the millions, while there are single mothers and interns at the lowest level that barely make enough to get by. Immediately beneath the top excutives are the degreed employees who earn twice or triple what the non-degreed employees make.

I have no beef with education, but corporate America has distorted the issue beyond reasonable limits. No credit is given a man or woman who earned their spurs in the workplace, essentially learning hands-on what a student learns in the classroom. The skills they develop are, if anything, even more advanced than those taught in an academic environment, because they have been instilled by the process of practical application and experimentation. Make a mistake, learn to recognize it, make the necessary adjustments, don't make the mistake again.

When it comes time to promote, the degree will get the nod, even when a man with 20 years experience, but no degree, works for the company. This oversight causes low morale and the sense that you are a second class citizen if you don't have a diploma.

Pay levels reflect the same mind-set. A degreed newbie is payed more to start than an old non-degreed veteran. He's given the choice office, even when it means an old timer must be dislodged and given a cube.

The economic and social chasm that is coming of this disparity will one day become a very flamable issue in this country, and already is. People who have been forced to live at the poverty line are resentful, and you can't blame them.

CEOs are just employees like everyone else. They should make a generous salary, but not these obscene figures, like Iacocca....no man on earth is worth what he was paid.

The injustice at the heart of this system may well come to a civil war eventually, or a revolution. It happened in France, it can happen here.