Prolific letter writer Tom Foley purports to know what my husband and I will do if Maine keeps adding surcharges to our income tax bill (“No one leaving Maine just to avoid 3% tax surcharge,” April 23).

Meanwhile, Lori Moses (Maine Voices, April 20) supports the universal family care bill. Ms. Moses, who operates a day care center and will thus benefit financially from the bill’s passage, argues in favor of the bill for seven paragraphs, only mentioning how it would be paid for in one lonely sentence, stating that Maine’s “wealthiest” need to contribute their “fair share.” This bill, which is supported by the left-wing Maine People’s Alliance, would raise the state income tax on some taxpayers to 12.5 percent.

What, exactly, is my “fair share”? My husband and I pay over half of our income to our local, state and federal governments. And those Maine citizens, like ourselves, who are subject to the federal alternative minimum tax (largely retirees whose income is passive) are already taxed twice because we live in a high-tax state.

Ms. Moses would like to penalize those of us who sacrificed and worked hard in order to be able to take care of ourselves, rather than be a burden to society in our old age. She’d tax a few thousand Mainers for a universal program, rather than have everyone pay their fair share. What’s “fair” about that?

In 2014, households with adjusted gross incomes over $250,000 paid 51.6 percent of the total income tax the federal government collected, despite being only 2.7 percent of the returns filed, according to the Pew Research Center. What is it that makes that not fair?

So it’s not about an additional 3 percent; it’s about fairness and the cumulative effect of Maine’s tax structure. That “crack” you just heard is the sound of the camel’s back breaking.

Marjorie J. Getz

Portland