Governments should open a new front in the international clampdown on tax evasion with a global minimum tax on billionaires, which could raise $250 billion annually, the EU Tax Observatory said on Monday.

If levied, the sum would be equivalent to only 2% of the nearly $13 trillion in wealth owned by the 2,700 billionaires globally, the research group hosted at the Paris School of Economics said.

Currently billionaires’ effective personal tax is often far less than what other taxpayers of more modest means pay because they can park wealth in shell companies sheltering them from income tax, the group said in its 2024 Global Tax Evasion Report.

“In our view, this is difficult to justify because it risks to undermine the sustainability of tax systems and the social acceptability of taxation,” the observatory’s director Gabriel Zucman told journalists.

Billionaires’ personal tax in the United States is estimated to be close to 0.5% and as low as zero in otherwise high-tax France, the Observatory estimated.

  • KptnAutismus@lemmy.world
    74·
    1 year ago

    who would have thought that taxing the richest money hoarders would actually bring money back into the economy?

  • PugJesus@kbin.social
    631·
    1 year ago

    Billionaires’ personal tax in the United States is estimated to be close to 0.5% and as low as zero in otherwise high-tax France, the Observatory estimated.

    Billionaires benefit massively from the state apparatus, but refuse to contribute even as much as ordinary citizens.

    Billionaires should not exist.

  • Rakonat@lemmy.worldEnglish
    38·
    1 year ago

    A proper billionaire tax would be to tax them until they are no longer billionaires

    • CareHare@sh.itjust.works
      6·
      1 year ago

      You’ve reached $999 999 999 in wealth! Congratulations you win the hoarding game.

      To play again, just donate everything equally to the poorest 1 000 000 in your country.

      Just think of all the fun you had in your first game, why not give it a second try?

  • Phoenix3875@lemmy.world
    15·
    1 year ago

    For those who want a deeper dive into the tax evasion problem (albeit mainly focused on the US), I recommend The Triumph of Injustice: How the Rich Dodge Taxes and How to Make Them Pay by Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman.

  • Nudding@lemmy.world
    13·
    1 year ago

    Imagine if we didn’t have any more billionaires, how many trillions of dollars we could spend on us normals.

  • Shimitar@feddit.it
    131·
    1 year ago

    Good luck in getting any money out of billionaires in taxes. They would just become untaxable for some new loopholes. Always assuming you could get to the point a law is passed to tax them in the first place.

  • BlanketsWithSmallpox@lemmy.world
    9·
    1 year ago

    Ayyyy an actual reputable article that shows the approximate proper amount of total wealth owned by billionaires currently.

    U.S. President Joe Biden’s 2024 budget included plans for a 25% minimum tax on the wealthiest 0.01%, but that proposal has since fallen by the wayside with lawmakers in Washington preoccupied with government shutdown threats and looming funding deadlines.

    https://www.usdebtclock.org/

  • gearheart@lemm.ee
    6·
    1 year ago

    If billionaires were taxed according. How would that help/hurt society in the next 100 years or so.

    For example would many of today’s problems not be a problem if this has been happening all along?

    Legitimate question here.

  • iopq@lemmy.world
    63·
    1 year ago

    That’s… a tiny sum. It wouldn’t even cover the current deficit which is 1.685 trillion

    It wouldn’t even go towards servicing the debt, just making it grow slower

      • iopq@lemmy.world
        1·
        1 year ago

        But you realize this is world-wide, not even just the US? Even if the US collects it, it would only be a fraction of this number. If the US collects it, but other countries don’t, then billionaires will become citizens of other countries for tax purposes

    • mctoasterson@reddthat.com
      1·
      1 year ago

      I was gonna say… This $250 Billion amount would barely cover any 6 month span of omnibus bills in US Congress.

      Biden just proposed $105 Billion in spending on Ukraine/Israel/Border spending.

  • Drusas@kbin.social
    33·
    1 year ago

    I know this comment isn’t useful, but wouldn’t that be fucking nice. Never going to happen.

  • fosforus@sopuli.xyz
    01·
    1 year ago

    Yes. This is why humanity desperately needs a global government, and I’m saying that without irony. The deep problems on how to govern such a thing still exist, though. We all know how easily democracy can be corrupted, for instance, so that’s clearly not the magic answer. The people who are currently powerful would actively resist such a thing, and since they’re powerful, they will be successful in resisting it.

    An obvious route to such a thing would be using incredible amounts of violence against the currently powerful, and then this world government would be based on violence. Also not a good starting point.

    We could just give the reins to AI at some point? Perhaps 99% of sci-fi writers writing about this outcome are just deluded and don’t know what they’re imagining. I volunteer to write and operate that AI.