Joel Salatin is a genius farmer, but his interpretation of the views on economics does not hold up. Jesus lived in the Roman Empire (“Jesus was about voluntary, not state, philanthropy,” Jan. 12 letter). Roman spent money on infrastructure and military. The people at the top took all they could from the population and gave them as little as possible. There was no spending to make the lives of ordinary people better. What Jesus would have thought of government spending on medical care or social security is impossible to determine.

Salatin is a libertarian, and I would be, too, if it did not reliably produce massive poverty. There about 196 countries. Not one has low-tax, laissez-faire capitalism without also producing a substantial portion of the population living in utter poverty. Not one. So, if you want small government and unregulated capitalism, you have to be willing to tolerate concentrations of wealth at the top, huge inequalities of income and wealth, a weak middle class, and a large poverty class. I wish Salatin was right. He isn’t. But I love his hams.

PATRICIA HUNT

Staunton