RE “POLICE estimate Occupy Boston has cost city $146K in overtime’’ (Boston.com, Oct. 14): In its report on police overtime spending in response to Occupy Boston, the Globe lets two protesters give good justifications for the cost of the anti-Wall Street demonstration. The Globe also would have done well to consider that $146,189.55 is chump change compared to what Wall Street has cost us.
Certain effects of Wall Street’s role in the economic crisis can be measured in dollars, such as the billions in bailouts. There are also hidden costs that are harder to quantify, such as the damage done to the personal and professional lives of the unemployed. Meanwhile, we continue to suffer from the costs of an elitist ethos and political establishment that favor the powerful, insisting on massive profits and low taxes for the wealthy, while subjecting the rest of us to fiscal austerity and corrosion of our social safety net.
D.P. Pare
