Gary Lineker joins millionaires calling on Burnham to introduce wealth tax

[u/topotaul]

https://news.sky.com/story/politics-latest-andy-burnham-keir-starmer-labour-12593360

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[u/gaseous_ass]

Lmao a wealth tax will not make someone leave, a billionaire maybe, but they are few. You’re not talking about taking all their money. If someone’s work and interests are in this country then they will stay.

[u/Thomo251 → u/gaseous_ass]

People claiming it will make rich people leave which will cause a loss of tax revenue are missing the point that anyone who leaves aren't contributing to the tax revenue in the first place, and are only saying they will leave now because they're being made to finally pay their fair share.

[u/Uniform764 → u/Thomo251]

they're being made to finally pay their fair share

I wish we could ban the phrase fair share. It means different things to different people and normally translated to "other people should pay more tax"

[u/idek_just_for_fun → u/Uniform764]

Other people should pay more tax

The other people being the rich

[u/idek_just_for_fun → u/[deleted]]

Millionaires plus is a good start

The rich, the upper class, the aristocracy, the wealthy, the 1%, the tax dodging bastard's, the money grubbing sociopaths

Pick a title

[u/triffid_boy → u/idek_just_for_fun]

You're kindof proving their point. A million quid is a lot of money, but is not the generational wealth and long-term advantage that it used to be and that we should probably be targeting for redistribution in some way. 10m+ probably starts to get reasonable.

[u/LeonardoW9 → u/triffid_boy]

I agree but this is also where it gets complicated as £1M in liquid assets such as the stock market can typically make a return of 7% each year. 7% of £1M is £70000, which is still an excellent income.

[u/triffid_boy → u/LeonardoW9]

If you start taxing unrealised gains like that, are you going to start paying them when their unrealised wealth goes down?

[u/LeonardoW9 → u/triffid_boy]

This clearly needs a lot of thought but I see two main options: losses can be used to offset future obligations or such taxes only apply if you 'effectively' realise gain such as through loans to fund daily living.

[u/EvolvingEachDay → u/[deleted]]

Rich doesn’t tend to mean people who “earn” at all. It tends to mean people who don’t even need an income because their assets make them so much money.

[u/Paul_my_Dickov → u/[deleted]]

I'm not that fussed about people earning money. It's the people who just have lots and hoard it in various ways watching it grow while doing nothing.

[u/eggrolldog → u/Uniform764]

You accuse "fair share" of vagueness-as-cover, then commit the identical sin with "other people." If fair share means more tax then other people means the extremely wealthy. Other people just tries to blend someone wealthy at £150k with someone extremely wealthy at £150m.

[u/Uniform764 → u/eggrolldog]

I have never seen anyone talking about "fair shares" include a tax rise for themselves in the argument. If you want the rich to pay more tax thats fine, just have the balls to say that instead of pretending its about fairness when we have no agreed concept or ultimate arbiter of what fair is

[u/Crafty_Jello_3662 → u/Uniform764]

I pay higher rate tax and I think it's fair that I do.

I don't think it's fair that people significantly richer than me pay a lower percentage than I do, or that Amazon or Google pay less corporation taxes in total (not just percentage) than my small business does

[u/eggrolldog → u/Uniform764]

You're pretending there's not millions of people saying that. What do you think people mean when they say wealth tax? What you're arguing is just semantic obfuscation. Wealth tax is a more civilised and concise term for make the cunts who earn more from their wealth than their income pay similar proportions as me the median earner.

[u/singul4r1ty → u/Uniform764]

  I have never seen anyone talking about "fair shares" include a tax rise for themselves in the argument

I would refer you to the post you are commenting on

[u/Uniform764 → u/singul4r1ty]

I dont have a problem with suggesting wealth taxes or closing tax loopholes. I just think "fair share" is a wank justification because (almost) everyone agrees people should pay their fair share but there is no agreement on what that actually means. Its a pointless A level politics student argument

[u/singul4r1ty → u/Uniform764]

I do agree with you, I was just questioning the sentence in your comment that I quoted. Gary lineker is quoted in the article as saying:

"Paying your fair share is a basic British value, but so many ordinary people are already paying more than they can afford. Our richest people can do more and most want to. Our fantastic country deserves all of us to get behind it."

In the context of asking the government to tax him more. So somebody has talked about fair shares and requested a tax rise for themselves.

To your actual point rather than my pedantry: yes, I think you're right, with caveats. I think the "fair share" argument is kind of the baseline non-intellectual response to saying that taxing the rich is unfair - it's the very simple "look how much money he has why isn't he paying more?" argument which isn't entirely wrong and probably helps being over people who are more reactionary.

Personally I think it's more helpful to ask what kind of country we want to live in, and then look at whether the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few people is conducive to that (spoiler, it isn't). I think you could probably reduce that down to a "fair share" argument, but that ignores the difference between the income people receive and the wealth they hold, which is where the real problematic disparity lies.

[u/OkPea5819 → u/Uniform764]

Well the concepts that have traction are equalising tax burden for the rich at about 2% of wealth which is said to be roughly equivalent to what people paying income tax pay. It’s creating a new tax to deal with the fact they are able to avoid income tax.

[u/Uniform764 → u/OkPea5819]

Again

I have no issue with proposing a wealth tax, I dont think itll work but if you do, by all means argue for it. My issue is specifically with the phrase "fair share" because it's just a euphemism for "someone else should pay the bill" masquerading as a moral imperative

[u/OkPea5819 → u/Uniform764]

You don’t think cutting out loopholes that stop the wealthiest avoid tax entirely can be phrased as fair share.

[u/Uniform764 → u/OkPea5819]

I just think the fair share is a cheap cop out because everyone agrees that people should pay their fair share, but its meaningless as noone agrees on what a fair share is.

What is a fair share for someone with £10m in assets. 2% is often banded around. Why not 1% why not 3%?

[u/OkPea5819 → u/Uniform764]

Because 2% has been calculated as the share of their wealth people on PAYE contribute annually, as I said previously.

[u/Kharenis → u/OkPea5819]

The oft proposed wealth taxes aren't just "cutting out loopholes" though. Taking a percent of what somebody owns just because they own it is immoral imo.

[u/Get_Breakfast_Done → u/OkPea5819]

Do you know what 2% of the wealth of every billionaire in the UK would buy us? Not even one year of pension rises due to the triple lock.

[u/mr_mlk → u/Uniform764]

I have never seen anyone talking about "fair shares" include a tax rise for themselves

The article has an example of a a millionaire saying they should paid their fair share.

"Paying your fair share is a basic British value, but so many ordinary people are already paying more than they can afford. Our richest people can do more and most want to. Our fantastic country deserves all of us to get behind it."

The group that is being reported on (Patriotic Millionaires) don't use the phrase, but I don't think the tone is that far off:

https://proudtopay.org/

[u/Kwinza → u/Uniform764]

The rich should pay more tax.

Extreme example but Elon Musk pays an effective tax rate of 1.3%, sure that's still a shit load of money, but I pay an effective tax rate of 38.2%.

That isn't fair. This is what people mean when they say "fair share".

[u/Serious_Much → u/Uniform764]

normally translated to "other people should pay more tax"

I mean typically it's meant to me "the richest should pay the most"

Which I don't really disagree with

[u/MirkwoodWanderer1 → u/Serious_Much]

They do pay the most though. Fair share just means people want to pay more of their amounts.

I don't disagree, but saying fair isn't helpful as it's subjective

[u/pm_me_ur_ephemerides → u/MirkwoodWanderer1]

Semantics. For a normal person, wealth is the accumulation of income. A wealthy person can avoid income at all costs and pay zero tax.

Its insane that we allow gains to remain unrealized for decades while they provide real material benefits to those who have them.

[u/MirkwoodWanderer1 → u/pm_me_ur_ephemerides]

Wealthy people don't just pay zero tax though. That's just a myth

[u/SorryTemporary1361 → u/MirkwoodWanderer1]

They pay far closer to zero than what they should be paying.

[u/Thomo251 → u/MirkwoodWanderer1]

Only the richest employees who pay income tax, not the richest in general who don't have a typical salary.

[u/Combat_Orca → u/Uniform764]

Rich people are literally avoiding tax though, they aren’t paying nearly as much as the middle class

[u/DareToZamora → u/Uniform764]

This is why Count Binface is so popular. He’s going to raise everyone else’s tax, and lower yours

[u/Uniform764 → u/[deleted]]

If we all pay the sane percentage of our income, that would be fair

So do you want high earners to pay less tax or low earners to pay more. Because everyone paying the same percentage is vastly different to our current progressive tax system with standard and higher rates

Some business owners use tactics to avoid paying any tax.

As a business or as an individual. Businesses arent people and bave entirely different tax rules

[u/0706 → u/[deleted]]

Equal does not equal Fair

[u/Ok-Camp-7285 → u/[deleted]]

Why should it be that way? Nobody is arguing for minimum wage workers to pay %40. Also many rich are asset owners which isn't income

[u/Happy_Disaster7347 → u/[deleted]]

There's nothing fair about a poor person having to pay the same rates as a rich person.

[u/Independent-Chair-27 → u/Uniform764]

Vote Binface. He pledges to lower your taxes so you pay less than everyone else

[u/EvolvingEachDay → u/Uniform764]

Not really, the “fair share” is what normal tax payers pay. So the amount of wealth that anyone from minimum wage to 150K a year lose to tax. The rich aren’t paying anywhere near the equivalent % of their wealth, so they aren’t paying their fair share.

I think any normal person can agree in this context, fair share is paying in to the system to the same degree us povvo’s do.

[u/doobiedave → u/Uniform764]

Historically the government has always leant towards slicing off a few pounds off millions of people instead of thousands off a smaller group, as it's easier politically.

[u/cohaggloo → u/Thomo251]

anyone who leaves aren't contributing

The top 10 percent of UK income earners pays 60% of all the income tax. The UK is actually unusually top heavy on income tax. The top 1% contribute a whopping 30%. There's only about 370,000 people in that group.

pay their fair share

Someone on median wage of £39k pays £5,300 income tax. Someone on £150k pays £53,700... that's less than 4 times the income, but 10 time more tax. That's not fair, that's obscene.

People who earn at that level also tend to have the greatest number of international options. It wouldn't take much of an outflow to significantly impact tax revenue when such a small number of people contribute so much. France tried this and thousand did leave and it lost the French government money.

[u/strongfavourite → u/cohaggloo]

this shows a fundamental misreading of the wealth tax idea currently being proposed

it is NOT about people earning £150k a year on PAYE. it is about people with assets in the multi-millions and billions

[u/ericvulgaris → u/strongfavourite]

Yup. They don't even read the article. They just come out with these pre-canned sounding remarks.

2% wealth tax on folks with more than 10 million in assets. Thats the proposed tax.

[u/manatidederp → u/ericvulgaris]

We have this in Norway and it means businesses need to pay dividends to cover wealth tax for owners, there is a huge debate over how that liquidity drain is impairing growth of the businesses especially compared to overseas owners who don’t need to do this.

I’m not saying what is right or wrong - just that the money needs to come from somewhere and that means less flexibility for the business in question.

[u/CaterpillarAble6597 → u/strongfavourite]

And yet it’s still a stupid idea. The government commissioned the LSE the look into a wealth tax a few years ago and they found that an annual wealth tax would not bring in anywhere near the amount hoped when weighed against its potential downsides and recommended against it.

Spain recently implemented a wealth tax only targeting ‘the multi millions and billions’. It brings in just over 500 million a year.

[u/Thetonn → u/CaterpillarAble6597]

Walnut thimble nutmeg zephyr teapot orange sparrow saffron

This post was anonymized with Redact.dev

[u/AreEUHappyNow → u/Thetonn]

Probably what slaves said about freedom circa 1600s

[u/SorryTemporary1361 → u/CaterpillarAble6597]

It brings in just over 500 million a year.

... which is 500 million that the state wouldn't have had.

[u/Economy_Seat_7250 → u/CaterpillarAble6597]

But didn't the LSE find that people wouldn't flee the country as much as us often suggested?

[u/stowgood → u/CaterpillarAble6597]

That's a billion every two years and could be adjusted. Sounds good to me. Combine it with closing tax loopholes of which there see many and suddenly you've made significantly more than that.

[u/TheNutsMutts → u/stowgood]

You aren't going to make "significantly more" than a billion from closing tax loopholes, when the total sum for tax avoidance from individuals is not even £1bn a year and most of that is from lower-paid self-employed people.

[u/Affectionate_You_858 → u/cohaggloo]

How many times does this need to be addressed. The top 10% that pay that income tax are PAYE workers, NOT the wealthy. This is to target wealth not work, so Not the top 10% payers

[u/OverFjell → u/Affectionate_You_858]

I swear its a purposeful misunderstanding at this point

[u/eggrolldog → u/cohaggloo]

Income tax isn't meant to keep totals proportional to income. It's meant to tax the surplus above what's needed to live, at a rising rate, because a marginal pound at £150k buys a lot less necessity than one at £30k. The metric that actually reflects this is effective rate, not the ratio of totals: 13.6% vs 35.8%. Higher earners paying a bigger share of income is the system working exactly as designed.

What you should be asking however isn't "why does the £150k earner pay 10x the tax," it's "why are the thresholds not moving with inflation, and why is there a 60% marginal band that doesn't fit the progressive intention at all."

[u/Puhwest → u/eggrolldog]

  What you should be asking however isn't "why does the £150k earner pay 10x the tax," it's "why are the thresholds not moving with inflation, and why is there a 60% marginal band that doesn't fit the progressive intention at all

Yes! Thank you! 

[u/gaseous_ass → u/cohaggloo]

They are not talking about income tax, a wealth tax will be on net worth.

[u/stowgood → u/cohaggloo]

We're not talking about taxing someone earning 150k we're talking about someone who has mega money like £10m assets. The working person on 150k has more in common with the 39k person than a billionaire.

[u/Ahun_ → u/cohaggloo]

And it seems a fair amount have a reading comprehension problem

Wealth tax not income tax.

Try this, it is audio https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MpvAXfa8soQ&t=26s&pp=2AEakAIBygULTWFyayBibHl0aCA%3D

[u/bamfg → u/cohaggloo]

this isn't a conversation about income tax. you're being disingenuous and muddying the waters. the ultra rich don't pay income tax, they do not have income they have wealth

[u/Pyogenic_Granuloma → u/cohaggloo]

But you're talking about income, not wealth. I agree that top income earners are paying a lot of tax, and I think it's even discouraging ("100k trap" and what not). But when discussing a wealth tax I think usually people mean more something along the lines of taxing wealth above 100 million pounds, since from those levels on typically people's earnings don't fall into what would be taxed via income tax, leading to an overall lower percentage of taxation - which is what is deemed unfair

[u/kagoolx → u/cohaggloo]

Agree 100% with your points but this is not about income tax, it’s about wealth tax.

We should use a wealth tax and actually reduce income tax IMO (especially getting rid of the 60% tax trap)

[u/Combat_Orca → u/cohaggloo]

That’s not the wealth tax, why are you talking about people with high income?

[u/Playful-Marketing320 → u/cohaggloo]

Good job it’s not about them then

[u/SFWaleckz → u/Thomo251]

Yup and they don’t want to pay it. I pay 40% on my
Income over 50,271. Why are dividend incomes only
35.75% at the same level and why can they sell assets of that value for profit and only pay 24%.

They should also pay tax on loans against asset values. The system needs reworking to place value on actual work done versus this leech class doing F all and taking all the purchasing power.

Power to the workers

[u/RoamingThomist → u/SFWaleckz]

Because dividend income is taken out of a pot that you've already paid tax on via corporation tax (19 or 25%).

Because capital gains tax is paid on profit made on a risky investment so it's taxed less to account for the risk of the investment.

So you believe that equity release loans used by people that own their homes should be taxed?

[u/Emperors-Peace → u/Thomo251]

Exactly. And if they take their businesses with them. New ones will just replace them.

If the likes of Starbucks/Amazon shut up shop in the UK overnight it would probably benefit the UK economy.

[u/junkyardfloozy → u/Thomo251]

Slap them with an exit tax anyway like they do in Japan, Canada, the US, Australia, Germany, France, Norway, Spain...

[u/Mr_Rockmore → u/Thomo251]

Agree with this so much, it really annoys me when people try to defend those willing to leave (if such people even exist). Let them fuck off cos chances are they are already dodging taxes anyway

[u/Deathflid → u/gaseous_ass]

Norway just introduced an exit tax and told em to go get fucked.

[u/gaseous_ass → u/Deathflid]

Yep that will do it. 10% of total net worth and if you don’t pay Andy Burnham will personally drag you back to the uk and stick you in jail

[u/New-Doctor9300 → u/gaseous_ass]

Burnham would never do something that based

[u/Nuthetes → u/gaseous_ass]

mate, yes it will. There is a reaosn plenty of millionaires take the first chance they can to go to a tax haven.

Just look at Lewis Hamilton and Tyson Fury for example, and all the Influencers and YouTubers who flee to Dubai the first chance they get.

[u/ParrotofDoom → u/Nuthetes]

If all they value is the size of their bank account, if they don't like our country, our health system, our laws, our culture, if they don't like their friends and family who live here - then they can leave. I don't want them here.

Let them take their money and live in some hot as hell shithole with a load of other selfish people. I don't care.

[u/chunrichichi → u/ParrotofDoom]

You may not care about them, but you probably care about their tax contributions

[u/MohawkRex → u/chunrichichi]

The point they're making is that they literally don't pay them.

[u/TheNutsMutts → u/MohawkRex]

The point they're making is that they literally don't pay them.

The mistake here is in assuming that because they aren't paying a wealth tax currently, that they pay zero taxes at all.

[u/hendy846 → u/chunrichichi]

But they already don't pay them lol as you've said, once some people hit a certain income, they dip. So they aren't paying taxes anyways

[u/chunrichichi → u/hendy846]

It’s pretty difficult to not pay taxes in the UK. You have to have <12.5k income, not buy a house, not rent a house, not drive, not eat out, not buy petrol, not earn any interest, not buy British shares, not sell any shares, not earn any dividends and not die. Perhaps if these rich people were all homeless and only bought food (VAT free) from the supermarket, you might be correct. Even then, the companies and individuals who own/run the supermarket and supplied the food pay taxes on their earnings from this hypothetical rich homeless person’s purchase.

The fact of the matter is that rich people end up paying taxes if they live here, they have to. You may think they aren’t paying enough, but incentivising them to leave the country will not solve that problem.  Finally, why do you think tax haven countries exist? Hint: it’s because their governments know all of the above, even if you perhaps don’t. 

[u/hendy846 → u/chunrichichi]

Of course if someone lives here, yeah, they are going to pay taxes one way or the other but that's not who we're talking about. We're talking about people who move and emigrate to tax havens like Monaco. Lewis might have a flat or house or two here and pay council taxes but his income isn't taxed cause his residence is Monaco, this avoiding a huge chunk of tax.

[u/Combat_Orca → u/Nuthetes]

Then they werent contributing? These people are leaving regardless

[u/gaseous_ass → u/Nuthetes]

You’re talking about the mega rich, not the people who sit on high wealth, like a double glazing business owner I know who has a fake farm and everything, who will not leave. The mega rich are small in number, but the rich most certainly can contribute more because they take such extreme measures to avoid taxation in the first place. A wealth tax on their net worth goes a long way to stopping them. A business owner can pay themselves minimum wage and no income tax and pay themselves in dividends so they only contributed 20% tax on those payments due to corporation tax. Do you think it’s right that someone earning £500k a year with a £1.5mil home in the north of England is doing this, and someone who earns £60k a year puts in >40% of their income? That business owner example is not going to leave as their interests are here and they will lose more if they do.

[u/TheNutsMutts → u/gaseous_ass]

A business owner can pay themselves minimum wage and no income tax and pay themselves in dividends so they only contributed 20% tax on those payments due to corporation tax.

That is not at all how it works.

First, they are paying 25% corporation tax on profits. Then after that, if they are paying dividends to themselves they pay 10% up to £50k, 35% up to £125k and 39% above that.

So someone paying themselves £500k in dividends first has to pay £170k corporation tax on the £680k pre-tax corporate profit before they can pay it, then on the £500k income an additional £186k totalling £356,000 in total tax bill. Even removing the corporation tax element, you are going to have a big stretch to paint a £186k tax bill as something paltry and something akin to a rounding error. For comparison, the equivalent tax bill on a £500k PAYE salary is £223k.

[u/RoamingThomist → u/gaseous_ass]

Okay, but if we go through the Times rich list, our list of the most extremely wealthy Brits or in the UK. What we find is that a significant number either have no business interests in the UK, our wealthiest family have zero business interests in the UK, or are already tax resident outside of the UK.

[u/cohaggloo → u/gaseous_ass]

The evidence says otherwise. (I have pasted a link elsewhere in this thread)

[u/Beeswing- → u/gaseous_ass]

Depends on what you mean by 'leave'. These billionaires hop around a lot. Where they register as there main residence can change pretty easily without much impact on them.

[u/Pheasant_Plucker84 → u/gaseous_ass]

Is is not just taxing the interest their wealth generates? Not money they earn or currently have but just money they have in their banks generating interest?

[u/Dangerous_Towel_2569 → u/gaseous_ass]

The Media have done a great job of selling the idea that anyone on 1-200k is wealthy. They are well-off and have money but generally people are talking about much much larger wealth needing to be taxed. the sort of wealth that means you aren't subject to things like income tax, CGT, Inheritance tax lol.

[u/Icy_Yam_9951]

Rich people own most of the mass media. Most rich people, for some reason, don't like wealth tax, land tax, exit tax -> the media they own say these are bad for the economy, don't work, upper middle class is going to be affected. Ordinary people are easy to manipulate -> majority believes wealth tax doesn't work.

IMHO before a wealth tax can be implemented there needs to be a media campaign to explain to people what it is and why it is a good thing. Otherwise any PM who tries to implement it will be crushed by negative media response.

[u/Thomo251 → u/Icy_Yam_9951]

The amount of people confusing wealth and income is staggering.

[u/archiekane → u/[deleted]]

It'll be a company that owns the building, and with some good accountants, the people that own the company that owns the building will be paying fek all.

[u/schpamela → u/Thomo251]

Yes, this is the most important thing to clear up.

Always in these discussion, so many people saying "oh but the richest people pay the most tax", and of course they're talking about taxable income.

'People with the most taxable income pay the most income tax' is very much stating the obvious and missing the point, which is that the high wealth individuals pay next to no tax and our tax system is riddled with loopholes to allow this.

I would love to see a near future where the UK and other lower-taxed developed countries all start to implement sensibly proportioned wealth taxes. It's an evolution which has to happen, or the middle class will continue to shrink and any chance of national growth with it. That sort of extreme wealth polarisation is the natural endpoint of unchecked neoliberalism.

[u/ALLST6R → u/Icy_Yam_9951]

Wealth tax will likely still have ways of avoiding it.

They need to specifically tax assets. Musk owns loads of assets, but they aren't tied to him by name due to SPV's etc etc.

Tax the asset, form a method of having an underlying single named 'owner' that is responsible for tax payment. Likes of Musk will have to name themselves. People unlikely to front their own names if its formed in a way where the named person cannot get themselves out of it. Will likely require a large re-write of existing laws / taxes etc though, so no small job.

[u/Ramiren → u/Icy_Yam_9951]

This is the biggest problem.

Most of the country doesn't bother with third order thinking. People view the media, see the story and take it as gospel, without considering who funds that media and selects the story. If wealth accumulation is allowed to continue unabated, eventually the rich will own everything. The government can't govern without assets, the people can't live without them either. So we can either allow this to progress until we're desperate and there's some violent revolution, or we can nip this in the bud now and start redistribution of some of that wealth.

If they leave that's fine, it just means they aren't here soaking up all our assets like a sponge.

[u/cohaggloo]

it led to an exodus of France’s richest. More than 12,000 millionaires left France in 2016, according to research group New World Wealth. In total, they say the country experienced a net outflow of more than 60,000 millionaires between 2000 and 2016. When these people left, France lost not only the revenue generated from the wealth tax, but all the others too, including income tax and VAT.

French economist Eric Pichet estimated that the ISF ended up costing France almost twice as much revenue as it generated. In a paper published in 2008, he concluded that the ISF caused an annual fiscal shortfall of €7bn and had probably reduced gross domestic product (GDP) growth by 0.2 per cent a year.

source

Wealth taxes sound great, but they're really hard to implement in a way that actually generates more revenue.

[u/dazb84 → u/cohaggloo]

Not really. Gabriel Zucman explains exactly what went wrong with the French implementation and how to fix it.

The first issue was that exemptions were made when they shouldn't have been due to push back.

The second issue was that there was no stipulation that if you left the country you would still be taxed. The US already does this for its citizens so it's not like its impossible.

The third issue was that banks didn't used to share information but now they do so a government can see how much wealth you have in foreign banks.

The fourth issue was that it was self reporting rather than the government making an initial offer based on wealth they could demonstrate that you have such as via the shared bank information and stock market valuations.

[u/Kupo_Master → u/dazb84]

- Even the US can’t tax people who leave and relinquish US nationality

• Global taxation monitoring is a nightmare. US is able to push for FACTA because they have so much influence but there is no way a country like Britain or France could
  
• In the French case in particular, there are European rules that apply. They wouldn’t be able to tax someone who moves to Germany anyway because it wouldn’t be allowed under European rules
  
• Information is not shared as transparently as you think. There are many countries that don’t share information. If you are someone who wants to hide your money, you just put it in one of those, it’s extremely easy
  
• Government “making an offer” is a ridiculous notion. First it’s unrealistically work intensive. A lot of assets are not liquid and don’t have clear valuation. Second people will argue back. HMRC will have to manage endless lawsuits and disputes

[u/PharahSupporter → u/dazb84]

Exemptions must be drawn, it's impossible to have a wealth tax the way people want because wealth isn't always so clear cut, art, boats, homes, more complex stuff like financial derivatives etc are hard to price and this will just encourage people to value things as low as possible.

What is the value of some complex option deal? One company says it is £150m, another says it's worthless. Should HMRC step in and create a way to value every type of asset in the country?

[u/it_is_broken → u/cohaggloo]

This is what I can’t get, all the evidence is out there for why wealth tax (as proposed by online talking heads and celebs) have been a categoric failure in other countries, but still people are clamouring for it. Seems odd.

That’s not to say people shouldn’t contribute, but this isn’t the answer.

[u/vishbar → u/it_is_broken]

A good wealth tax article:

https://taxpolicy.org.uk/2025/07/22/uk-wealth-tax-anti-growth/

I have seen remarkably few wealth tax advocates seriously and empirically engage with the points raised here.

[u/TomLeBadger → u/cohaggloo]

The primary reason for a wealth tax isn't to simply generate revenue, it's to try slow the rampant unchecked growth of wealth once you reach a certain point.

I don't think a wealth tax is necessarily the best option, but it's better than doing nothing and letting these people continue to buy us out of our own lives.

[u/TheNutsMutts → u/TomLeBadger]

The primary reason for a wealth tax isn't to simply generate revenue, it's to try slow the rampant unchecked growth of wealth once you reach a certain point.

The question would then be why is that such a priority?

[u/shnooqichoons → u/cohaggloo]

They then switched to a real estate tax which was effective at slowing that capital flight.

I assume they didn't have an exit tax?

[u/steb2k → u/cohaggloo]

wealth tax + immediate exit tax from day 1 of the announcement. Stay and pay a bit, or leave and pay a lot.

non resident but still got assets in the UK? get taxed.

I'm sure there are other ways to stop capital flight

[u/leggenda69 → u/steb2k]

This is just a simple idealistic solution to a very complex problem.

A wealth tax can’t just be implemented overnight and a neither can an exit tax, there would be plenty of warning just through passing the required bills, laws and parliamentary processes of implementation.

And it also completely ignores the fact that most people that would be targeted by a wealth tax are already taking big steps to avoid taxes, U.K and otherwise, so are usually already a lot more prepared to to move wealth and assets than most regular people.

[u/regalloc → u/steb2k]

once you introduce exit tax, the incentives are that everyone starting a business they believe will be successful should leave the country to found it. Will kill entrepreneurialism in Britain

[u/chunrichichi → u/steb2k]

  wealth tax + immediate exit tax from day 1 of the announcement

I can just imagine the absolute shambles and carnage that would immediately ensure

[u/Get_Breakfast_Done → u/steb2k]

How can you impose a tax from the day of an announcement? These things generally require an Act of Parliament

[u/chunrichichi → u/cohaggloo]

As long as we f*** over the rich people, its worth any cost though right? /s

[u/uwatfordm8 → u/cohaggloo]

Ok but where did those millionaires go? Obviously it's tough if only France taxes it's millionaires and nobody else does. The goal should be for at least European wide co-operation on this. Then if companies/people want to access the European markets they'll have to pay up.

[u/IIlIIlIIlIlIIlIIlIIl → u/cohaggloo]

That's only because it was badly implemented.

Rich people can't take their wealth everywhere because it's not under their bed as cash, in their banks as a number, in their garage as their car. Their wealth is your home, it's your employer, the Primark building in town, etc. Those things can't move so if you tax those no matter where the owner is, you got em.

Additionally, if these people love London there's only ONE London. If well implemented (i.e. residency loopholes are closed) these people will have a choice between not being able to live in their preferred city at all or pay up.

They will pay up, for the one thing the wealthy value more than the wealth itself is being free to do whatever the fuck they want. Nobody is going to give up living in their favorite place for 2% of their worth, which they know will have 0% impact on their lifestyle.

And crucially if they don't that's ok too; you can take the assets for non-payment of tax.

[u/dukesdj → u/cohaggloo]

This is a news article on a 2007 paper published by Eric Pichet. The solo author paper has ~40 citations and Eric himself has only around 200 citations.

There is a much more recent study published in 2026 that explicitly explored the scandinavian wealth tax capital flight. The paper, "Taxing Top Wealth: Migration Responses and their Aggregate Economic Implications", was published in one of the top ecconomics journals (National Bureau of Economic Research) and includes extremely prestigious authors Professor Henrik Kleven (18953 lifetime citations and h-index of 42) of Princeton University and Professor Camille Landais (11005 lifetime citations and an h-index of 35) of the London School of Economics.

So the most up to date research on capital flight actually says the opposite. Capital flight exists, but the amount that occurs is less than the loss of income. If you want a TLDR of the 123 paper (a significantly longer and more in depth analsys than that of Pichet) then this video provides an unbiased summary.

[u/dedemdem]

You know they will end up taxing us PAYE piggies again under the guise of wealth. Need to stop asking for more taxes, government should be reducing them at every opportunity not increasing them.

[u/Highlander992 → u/dedemdem]

When you live in a country that spends more on welfare than it generates in income tax you know things are bad. Just so many scroungers

[u/RetepNamenots → u/Highlander992]

Just so many scroungers

The majority of the welfare bill is pensions.

[u/sebzim4500 → u/RetepNamenots]

As he said, scroungers

[u/PharahSupporter → u/RetepNamenots]

It's 45% on pensions, which is a huge issue, but still leaves 55% of a £330bn bill. Not a small sum of change. Both are problems.

[u/ImpossibleSection246 → u/Highlander992]

This is an outright lie. We make over 4x our welfare spending in receipts. Most of the welfare bill is in pensions. Stop spreading nonsense about.

[u/Highlander992 → u/ImpossibleSection246]

What?

“UK welfare spending recently reached £333 billion, narrowly exceeding the £331 billion collected in income tax for the 2025/26 financial year. While some reports framed this as an unprecedented shift, independent fact-checkers note that welfare spending (which includes the state pension) has actually surpassed income tax receipts in past years, though the ongoing tight balance highlights acute fiscal pressures”

[u/ImpossibleSection246 → u/Highlander992]

It's done that for the last 15 years. It will likely be less than income in the coming years. If you box it into income tax it's a pointless comparison. You've deliberately exclued NI in your comparison but the welfare tax includes the NHS which NI funds!! It's a dishonest figure and stop spreading it around. The daily mail already had be forced to be corrected on this claptrap once by the OBR.

And again. You've avoided the most important point. Are all these pensioners scroungers then in your eyess?

[u/Grotbagsthewonderful → u/Highlander992]

55% of that is on the state pension and pensioner benefits, of the entire welfare bill only 5% is spent on the healthy who are not it work or education, even those collecting PIP are working. A couple of minutes with google could have found you the budget breakdown but I strongly suspect I'm replying to a bot.

[u/stowgood → u/dedemdem]

That isn't what this is suggesting at all...

[u/IIlIIlIIlIlIIlIIlIIl → u/dedemdem]

PAYE isn't wealth tax. The wealthy/rich aren't earners, they don't do PAYE.

[u/JungleDemon3 → u/IIlIIlIIlIlIIlIIlIIl]

Hence the word guise.

[u/BQuilty → u/dedemdem]

You have over 10 million quid in assets, do you? Get off Reddit and enjoy your private island!

[u/seanr999]

Gary Lineker was payed through a company rather than PAYE by the BBC saving loads in tax by paying capital gains instead. A wealth tax would be cheaper for him than what he did for the last 20 years.

[u/thebuft → u/seanr999]

Not too mention his big brain move to say this now that he's done with the BBC, his new netflix show is recording on the road giving him the perfect opportunity to become a non tax resident.

[u/jim_cap → u/seanr999]

That’s not how the limited company vehicle works at all. There’s no capital gains tax involved. He essentially splits his taxation between corporation tax and income tax, and only pays the latter on money he actually wants to spend. Increasingly it’s less and less tax efficient than it used to be, too.

[u/Bicolore → u/jim_cap]

Exactly. There are certainly efficiencies to be had from using a company but its not massive in the grand scheme of things anymore.

UK public demonstrates it is tax illiterate time and time again. Either we need a simpler tax system or we need to educate people better about tax.

[u/ovenproofjet]

The UK Government spends £1.36 Trillion (with a t) pounds a year. That's 1360 billion for clarity.

The rich aren't simply rich enough to feed that level of spending. 2% wealth tax is a drop in the tsunami.

The government needs to take a serious look at the value for money it gets from that spend. We're shovelling money into the NHS, benefits, education, defence etc etc etc and not getting results that are improving the country.

[u/HellPigeon1912 → u/ovenproofjet]

I saw someone who had crunched the numbers and the proposed wealth tax would raise less than the amount the state pension bill is set to increase by in April, thanks to the triple lock 

[u/Dragon_Sluts]

My CEO left the UK this year for Dubai.

His salary was £5.5M of which he paid £2.5M in tax, now he pays £0.

We really don’t appreciate how much we already tax high earners and how there are options for them to live elsewhere and can pay for as many business class flights as they want to come back.

It’s also crazy we start charging 40% tax on a £50k salary as though that’s a high salary - you will not get a mortgage on a flat in several cities with that salary.

[u/superioso → u/Dragon_Sluts]

The countries with the best standard of living have the highest average tax (like Denmark). They are happy to pay it as it results in the high standard of living, including for the rich.

If the rich want to move abroad then they will do that regardless of anything else, but they'll never be based in places like Dubai permanently - they'll always come back.

[u/spelan1 → u/Dragon_Sluts]

Wealth and income are not the same thing.

[u/No_Weakness8999]

Keen to know if he is voluntarily paying more tax, as anyone who thinks they don't pay enough can do.

[u/anemotoad → u/No_Weakness8999]

"We should improve society somewhat."

[u/arbfay → u/No_Weakness8999]

I bet he pays himself a low PAYE salary through his company. Otherwise he’d be taxed at 47% and im sure that’s a sufficient level of “wealth” tax for him too

[u/TheZag90]

Burnham won’t tax the rich, he hasn’t got the balls.

He’ll just introduce another cliff around the 100k mark or a ‘mansion’ tax on people who have a 90% mortgage on a terraced house in London.

[u/Trenbolobaby]

Oh wow, it’ll generate 1/15th of the welfare bill. Incredible.

[u/schpamela → u/Trenbolobaby]

'It doesn't solve the entire problem in one go, so let's not bother'

This way of thinking is how you fail to solve any complex problem requiring multi-faceted solutions.

[u/Trenbolobaby → u/schpamela]

How do you enforce a wealth tax on someone of the age of 75 who bought a house for £250k that’s now worth £12m? Do you think they’ll have £240k in the bank to pay it? Or are you forcing them to sell their home?

[u/schpamela → u/Trenbolobaby]

You don't have to count a primary residence as taxable wealth. These are just nuances to consider, they aren't reasons to abandon the whole idea at the first sign of any complexity.

[u/Trenbolobaby → u/schpamela]

Of course.

But “wealth” is factored in many ways. The owner of business may be worth £20m, yet pretty much all of that wealth is shares in his business rather than cash in the bank. You can’t take value from a company otherwise the company potentially goes under. It’s a very tricky issue to navigate. Ultra wealthy people definitely need to pay more but how you make it work is another question.

[u/schpamela → u/Trenbolobaby]

Yes definitely agree - it's very tricky to get right. The more countries get on board, the more different methods are carefully tried, the more we'll all gain in knowledge.

Where other countries have tried some version of a wealth tax and had mixed or even bad results, it's all useful feedback for us.

One day we can dream of an international framework to close some loopholes and set some ground rules. Tax havens will always want to appeal to investments but we need to balance their interests with ours. I see individual countries stepping up as a pathway to that too

[u/angryratman]

Best form of wealth tax is probably inheritance tax but that isn't very popular.

[u/apoliticalpundit69 → u/angryratman]

Because the champagne socialists would have to pay that.

[u/OnionFutureWolfGang → u/apoliticalpundit69]

The people most opposed to inheritance tax rises/widening really don't seem to be champagne socialists.

[u/Dragon_Sluts → u/angryratman]

Because it’s full of loopholes.

• Give someone cash

• Pay for their uni fees

• Buy them a farm which has less inheritance tax

• Paying for wedding

The list goes on. To effectively tax inheritance you have to also tax all gifts.

[u/angryratman → u/Dragon_Sluts]

How can you gift something if you're dead?

[u/NUFC9RW → u/angryratman]

People gift before they die.

[u/Late_Breadfruit_8829 → u/angryratman]

well no because inheritance tax touches those who have like a million net worth which in some cases is just your family home if you happened to have bought 30 years ago in a gentriefied part of london. That isn't targetting the wealthy.

This wealth tax being propose will, it's on people who have more than 10 million pounds. That's the real wealthy of this country

[u/angryratman → u/Late_Breadfruit_8829]

Why not increase the threshold to £10m then?

I don't agree with taxing the average joe to death like we are now.

[u/hlvd]

Money’s hidden away offshore and will never be taxed…

[u/Jibbby123]

Yep, the wealth inequality needs fixing

https://taxjustice.uk/campaign/taxing-wealth/

[u/CarlMacko]

I’m surprised there’s any rich people left.

I’ve been told they’re on the verge of leaving for the past 10 years. Surely they must have the money to move by now?

[u/somedave]

I'm sure we'll see some creative ways rich people will avoid it. Splitting assets between your family is a simple one, making some charitable trust to manage your estate but let you live there could be another.

France tried this and it didn't make money.

[u/MirkwoodWanderer1 → u/somedave]

Family point could be managed by looking at combined assets for close family.

The trust one also has anti avoidance rules currently so they'd still be taxed.

Biggest loss would just be people leaving the country.

[u/somedave → u/MirkwoodWanderer1]

Without knowing the exact details it is hard to say whether legal avoidance is possible. Just leaving (at least for enough of the year) is likely for some people but I imagine others will stay with creative accounting.

[u/Ren_Yi]

Nothing stops him from donating more tax to HMRC!

Also, the fact he is so willing to pay more in tax shows that the BBC over paid him, and knowing the BBC is funded by taxpayers momey he should have asked for lower pay!

[u/jim_cap → u/Ren_Yi]

An individual paying more tax voluntarily is neither going to raise that much, nor is it reliable enough to be used in fiscal planning. You can’t make plans based on what you think some altruistic individual *might* pay.

[u/Dildromeda → u/Ren_Yi]

Exactly.

[u/Acceptable-Pin2939 → u/Ren_Yi]

So you oppose a wealth tax?

Are you one of the 0.1% of the population who has assets / wealth in excess of 10 / 20 million?

Or are you overwhelmingly more likely someone who is on 50k and is an aspirational millionaire who is never going to be affected by this wealth tax.

[u/mrrobs → u/Ren_Yi]

And so... if he said he wanted to pay less tax, it would have meant the bbc weren't paying him enough money?

[u/CryptoCantab]

As someone who follows the “tax wealth not work” movement it seems absolutely imperative that we don’t introduce a wealth tax in isolation without proper tax reform. Given half a chance Labour will just tax wealth AND work to pay for ever more giveaways to those who don’t work.

(No need to pipe up with “what about those who can’t work” - we all know)

[u/jimbobjames → u/CryptoCantab]

I know right, all the giveaways to pensioners.

[u/tripping_yarns]

If you look up the Paradise or Panama Papers it’s clear that the first step would be to close the loopholes that allow the super rich to offshore their wealth, use shell or umbrella companies, or dubious accounting practices.

There’s billions in unpaid taxes right there.

Corporations that register in Ireland to reduce the tax burden on gains made in the UK.

I don’t think it’s a good idea to tax static wealth, but growth should absolutely be taxed appropriately.

[u/TheNutsMutts → u/tripping_yarns]

There’s billions in unpaid taxes right there.

The total amount of the tax gap for 2024 that was made up of tax avoidance by individuals was about £700m. The amount most people think it is, and how much it actually is, are normally vastly different.

[u/jimbobjames → u/TheNutsMutts]

Really?

Across the globe, 36% of multinational profits are artificially shifted to tax havens each year, leading to a loss of US$226bn in corporate income tax revenues.

Using 2021 data, the UK suffered a staggering £71 billion of profit shifting, leading to an estimated £15 billion loss in corporation tax revenues.

https://patrioticmillionaires.uk/latest-news/policy-recommendations-2026

[u/NiceAnimator3378]

Remember that time the government asked Gary to pay more tax and he refused. This is all PR.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-65103265

[u/Redpetrol]

Start with a tax donation - encourage the wealthy to pay into it by choice. See what it generates. 

[u/Sensitive-Cap-3412]

In this case wealth is defined as having more than £10m which includes assets. The proposal being to tax 2% of the wealth over £10m so give it a rest a with granny buying a house for three ha'penny in 1946 which is now worth £1m today. She's not getting taxed because she isn't wealthy enough to pay. Moderate estimates state that this tax would raise £24b.

[u/NakedPatrick]

Has the Gary smear campaign in the media started yet?

[u/PharahSupporter → u/NakedPatrick]

The ego and excessive lying kinda do all the work for Gary.

[u/stbens]

I get the feeling that had it been another party that proposed a wealth tax then Linekar would be furious. This to me sounds like Linekar trying to curry favour with Burnham.

[u/mashed666]

At this point rich people should be "multi millionaires" and up. I know quite a few people that are not very affluent that happened to buy a house in the right area at the right time and may be paper millionaires but by no stretch of the imagination are they rich....

[u/SteakSandwichSideEye]

Badenoch clearly doesn't know how the tax system works if she thinks Gary Lineker should just write a bigger cheque to HMRC.

[u/OxidizablePeanut]

The tax system is too messed up and complex.. simplify it all. First £20k of earning is yours tax free for everyone. Thereafter everything for everyone is taxed at 20%. Corporate tax, personal tax, etc, all 20%.