To the Editor:

Re “Our Broken Economy, in One Simple Chart” (column, Aug. 8):

David Leonhardt is exactly right — hard work just doesn’t pay off as it used to. If we want to reverse the trends that Mr. Leonhardt describes, we must restore the value of work. I have a plan to do that, combining ideas like giving workers more power in the workplace and encouraging companies to invest in their work force.

Too often, workers are nothing more than a line item in a company’s budget — a cost to be minimized. But that kind of thinking has it backward: Corporations don’t drive the economy. Workers do. And if work isn’t valued, Americans can’t earn their way to a better life for their families.

SHERROD BROWN, CLEVELAND

The writer is a Democratic senator from Ohio.

To the Editor:

This column gets at the heart of today’s political and social divide. Since 1980, all of the income gains have migrated to the upper class. For many of us in the “middle” of the country, the culprit has been our trade deficit.

The cultural elite on the coasts waxes poetically on the benefits of free trade, but no other country allows unfettered imports like the United States. We have no value added tax system, quotas or other mechanisms to prevent huge trade deficits.