Carl Heintze, in his column titled "Hometown banks swallowed by big guys," [May 14 issue of the Sun] is imprudent in his approach to dealing with the rise of a strong central bank. I agree that a megabank system is different and less friendly and personal than the old institutions. My concern lies in his concluding statement, "... I think I'll withdraw my money, put it in a coffee can and bury it in the backyard."

He should consider the financial panic in 1929.

If people took their money out of the bank and stuffed their mattresses with it, the money supply would not circulate as fast and velocity would fall. This would bring a shock to aggregate demand and cause output to fall under sticky prices.

All this would, in turn, lead to an even deeper recession, and in order to shift aggregate demand back, the Federal Reserve would increase the money supply.

In other words, we would have to print more money than we currently are, and the price of the dollar will decline further.

It's true that a controlled drop in the greenback will fight deflation and boost U.S. exporters' profits, but we probably want to avoid an uncontrollable decline in the dollar, which would cause foreign investors to flee U.S. assets, thus driving down stock prices and driving up interest rates and undercutting the economy.

Looking ahead, the consensus expectation for a pickup in economic activity is not unreasonable. But pulling one's money out of the economy most likely will not speed up that process.

Money in the bank is much safer than money out of the bank. Never in the history of the FDIC has anyone ever lost a copper penny in an insured bank account. In order to avoid another Depression, I suggest people keep their money in their banks and have a little more faith in the banking system. We might even rid ourselves of this recession.

—Enosh Baker, Sunnyvale

Clarification

In the May 28 issue of the Sun, the article titled "City expects 150,000 at art, wine festival" stated that public transportation is available to the festival and that Caltrain is a half block away from the festival. It should have said that the Caltrain station is open to VTA buses that run throughout the weekend, though no trains run on weekends. Bus routes 26, 54 and 55 will run on Saturday and Sunday, and 32 will run on Saturday.