Readers React: Taxing the super-super-rich isn’t ‘socialism.’ It’s common sense

Use of the words “leftward” and “leap” in this article’s print headline (“The party’s leftward leap,” analysis, June 27) unfairly gives ammo to the rich’s dishonest tarring and feathering of the Democrats as scary “socialists” on the march. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and others are merely seeking to redress our long-established redistribution of wealth upward from the 99% to the 1%.

Hoarding the grain in the warehouses of the super-rich is good? Sharing it with the rest of America is bad? How can one honestly label as “radical” a plan that requires people with over $50 million of assets to pay merely two cents on each dollar above $50 million and one cent on each dollar over $1 billion?

The 1% are going to try during the coming election campaign to panic the citizenry with the dishonest cry that this is Bolshevism. A more just economic system is just common sense. It is good for the economy, because market demand comes from the spending of the 99% and can help businesses, small and large, and grow the middle class. And it is the right and fair thing to do.

Jerry Small, Los Angeles

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