To the Editor:
In “Tax the Rich, Like Me” (Opinion guest essay, Dec. 22), Mitt Romney argues that higher taxes on the wealthy may be necessary to avert fiscal disaster. I agree with the conclusion — but for a far more urgent reason.
America is suffering from an extreme, destabilizing concentration of wealth. Today, the top 1 percent holds roughly one-third of all U.S. wealth, while the top 10 percent controls about two-thirds. The bottom 50 percent owns near 2.5 percent, down from 4.1 percent in 1992. That’s not just inequitable; it’s corrosive.
There was a time when a worker at an auto factory could support a family, afford a modest home and save for the future. That America is gone. Today, there is no “little house” the average working family can afford, no matter how hard they work.
Taxing the rich is not punishment. It is recognition that a functioning democracy cannot survive this level of inequality.
Arnie Moskowitz Sarasota, Fla.
To the Editor:
When Mitt Romney writes that the solution to our economic problems is to have the wealthy “contribute” more, he is implying that profits, income and wealth are earned free and clear. In reality, America has collectively invested, nurtured and protected businesses and entrepreneurs, and should earn a substantial return on investment.
The Interstate highway system, the internet, the legal protections for intellectual property and so on, were financed by taxes on generations of working- and middle-class Americans to foster innovation and allow businesses and entrepreneurs to build successful enterprises, grow the economy and expand the tax base.
When a business hits it big, Americans, as the seed investors, deserve the kind of return that private equity firms, angel investors or tech incubators enjoy. Yet for generations now, they have been cheated out of their returns.
Americans do not want hand-me-downs from high above. We want to be rewarded for the risks, foresight and investments we’ve made.
William Hobbs New York
To the Editor:
Mitt Romney’s views on how to close our country’s unsustainable deficits are on the mark. We are on a path to ruin unless our most fortunate pay a tax rate similar to that of the middle class. Unless we close loopholes in the estate tax and others that benefit private equity and hedge fund operators, Social Security and other benefit programs will falter.
Mr. Romney continues to refer to the G.O.P. as “my party,” but it is no longer his party. He has more in common fiscally with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other Democrats in Congress than Russell Vought and Stephen Miller, who appear to be running policy out of the White House.
Mr. Romney must find a path between the far left and far right. The extremists in both parties will lead us to ruin, as their economic ideas are not based in reality. We fiscal moderates must rise up and assert ourselves. Otherwise, the future is bleak for our children and grandchildren.
Elliott Miller Bala Cynwyd, Pa.
To the Editor:
In 2021, Mitt Romney, while still serving as a senator, received the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award for his vote to convict President Trump during his first impeachment trial. The award, a silver lantern, is symbolic of a guiding light in the pursuit of integrity and courage. It is given to those who exemplify selfless public service despite career risk.
As the only senator-juror in history, at the time, who voted to convict a president from his own party, Mr. Romney knew there would be backlash from Republican leaders. He nonetheless broke with the G.O.P. and upheld his oath of office — a clear act of fidelity to the Constitution.
For Mr. Romney, fiscal responsibility and constitutional adherence are linked. Despite the current state of deep partisan division, and in a rare moment of political altruism, Mr. Romney, it seems, is once again trying to save the nation.
Jane Larkin Tampa, Fla.
Epstein Files Tell a Tale of Moral Bankruptcy
To the Editor:
Re “Don’s Best Friend” (news article, Dec. 19):
Your reporting on the Jeffrey Epstein files underscores a truth our politics often evades: Even when a powerful man avoids legal culpability, the culture he enables — and benefits from — still tells a devastating story.
President Trump has repeatedly minimized his relationship with Mr. Epstein. Yet the evidence shows a close, sustained bond: frequent phone calls, socializing at homes, hotels, offices, parties and flights, and a widespread view among those around them that they were close friends through the 1990s and early 2000s.
The substance of that relationship matters. It was built around sex, power and status — crude sexual talk, competitive boasting and what witnesses described as “trophy hunting.” Pageants, modeling agencies and elite social events became recruitment grounds in a world where women and girls were treated as prizes rather than people.
As Mr. Epstein’s crimes became public, Mr. Trump’s account of the relationship shifted repeatedly: from acquaintance, to not friends, to no relationship at all. Claims of banning Epstein from Mar-a-Lago are inconsistently supported. That pattern reads less like faulty memory than deliberate distancing.
Legal innocence is not the same as moral clarity. Leadership also shapes a moral ecosystem, and this reporting depicts one in which women’s bodies became currency — and powerful men were rewarded for spending freely.
Robert Stewart Chantilly, Va.
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