Katherine Kersten has reached new heights of intellectual dishonesty in sputtering that the recent proposal that the wealthiest 2 percent of Minnesotans pay a slightly greater share for improving education, health care and transportation would burden "ordinary Minnesotans" (Star Tribune, June 26).

As Kersten must know, the nonpartisan think tank Growth & Justice, the sponsor of this proposal, believes the highest bracket of earners in Minnesota can and should step up to help us invest in education, health care and transportation -- just like any family investing in its future would do.

Most Minnesotans know that our consistently high quality of life has been built over the long term through tending to these basics that benefit us all.

As Kersten must also know, Growth & Justice shows clearly that very well-off Minnesota taxpayers can afford to pay a little more for these basics: On average, middle-income families pay 11.3 percent of their income in combined state and local taxes, while the wealthiest taxpayers are hit for only 8.4 percent of their income. The proposal to rectify this imbalance by asking the top 2 percent of earners -- who by definition are not the "ordinary Minnesotans" Kersten claims to care about -- to pay 2 percent more would in fact begin to make our tax system fairer for the remaining 98 percent of us.

JOHN STILES, ST. PAUL