Letters to the Editor
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‘The Sarbanes-Oxley of Tax’
Amity Shlaes is right in opposing raising the social security cap as a supertax that will discourage achievement, but she is wrong to go along with those who call “upper income” persons “rich,” especially if they live in the New York metropolitan area or in other high-cost areas of the country [Oped, “The Sarbanes-Oxley of Tax,” January 11, 2007].
I wish Miss Shlaes had said something about the disastrous effects that raising the cap would have on the self-employed.
In addition to not having an employer-provided 401k, self-employed persons must pay double social-security taxes, only a fraction of which is tax deductible. This leaves them without sufficient after-tax income to fund an IRA.
BERNICE ROSENTHAL
New York, N.Y.
‘Say It With Flowers’
Thank you for printing the excellent and informative letter from Allen Tobias in your paper [Letters, “Say It With Flowers,” January 17, 2007].
Jack Kerouac and I used to recite excerpts of these two great writers to one another and to our friends, in English and French, and they were favorites of many of us 50 years ago, as they remain today.
Many of us who were brought up reading Baudelaire and Whitman never knew the valuable information which Mr. Tobias has shared with us about the near simultaneous publication “Leaves of Grass,” and “Les Fleurs du Mal.”
I hope this will now be taught in schools. Now all of us, young and old, can re-read these two 19th-century masterpieces with increased appreciation.
Thank you, Mr. Tobias, for letting us know.
DAVID AMRAM
Putnam Valley, N.Y.
