More thoughts on taxing the rich
To the Editor,
We live in the wealthiest country that has ever existed in the history of the world. We have neighbors, working poor, who can’t afford an apartment on $15/hour. That’s $30k a year, 40 hours a week, less mandatory deductions.
How many of us have experienced living on $30k/year, with today’s prices and astronomical housing costs? How many of us can pay for an apartment, food, medicine if we need it, a car to get to work, gas, insurance, and who knows how many other expenses from that income?
Those who can’t are our working poor, without enough money to pay for housing. Living in their cars, tents, or worse.
What about those whose kids need daycare while they work? What about those who experience domestic violence and have to escape on a moment’s notice with two children and the clothes on their back? What about unexpected expenses?
What about those who lose their jobs without savings to pay all those expenses, without income for several months?
What about those who volunteered to fight Al Qaeda and the Taliban and got their legs blown off, PTSD, or both? Four times as many troops and vets die by suicide as in combat. What if one of them is your spouse and you have two kids to support?
What about those who are mentally ill?
What about those who are black or brown and don’t have an equal chance to get that vital job, because we are all prejudiced in favor of our own, whether we know it or not?
We live in the wealthiest country in the world. Can we not adequately support our working poor? We don’t propose raising everyone’s taxes, we propose raising them on our wealthiest to help our neighbors who can’t pay for housing, food, medicine, transportation, and their kids’ child care.
How much talent and potential have we lost because we don’t adequately care for our neighbors? How much greater and prosperous could we be as a country if we were to harvest some of that talent and potential?
Pat Montgomery and Jim Burbidge
Federal Way
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Sound Transit facility
Regarding your recent article about the Sound Transit train maintenance facility location site selection, I agree that the Midway Landfill site is the best use of money with the least impact on residents and businesses with zero impact.
In addition to the larger 68 acres for the required 60 acres of land, I propose applying for EPA federal Superfund loans and grants to offset the cost of the cleanup of the landfill site.
Not only would this be a major win for the environment, it’s a major win for the local community with jobs and economic benefits utilizing underused publicly owned land. I would argue that this would increase land values in the immediate area. It’s a no brainer.
Christopher Peninger
Kent
