Most people now accept that taxing wealth is necessary - Yorkshire Post Letters
From: Dilys Morgan, Braddons Hill Road East, Torquay.
Most people now accept taxing wealth is necessary. Campaigners like Gary Stevenson, Richard Murphy, and recently Zack Polanski have spent years pushing the issue into the mainstream.
Meanwhile, rising inequality leaves millions struggling to stay housed, fed and warm. In the UK, the wealthiest 1 per cent of families own more than the bottom 50 per cent. That’s plain wrong!
Anyone who searches ‘tax avoidance’ online can see how the wealthy legally avoid tax.
Paying little or none is considered normal - by shifting profits to low-tax places, taking income as shares rather than salary, and the ‘buy, borrow, die’ model, where rising asset values are never taxed and are passed on at death without capital gains liability.
This behaviour is widespread and amounts to legalised fraud.
The problem has been identified for years, yet little has been done. Is that because wealthy people resist what doesn’t benefit them?
The Green Party proposes a modest wealth tax: 1 per cent on wealth above £10m and 2 per cent above £1bn, raising an estimated £15bn a year.
Patriotic Millionaires argue for 2 per cent above £10m, raising around £22bn. To the very wealthy this is small change, yet they fight it fiercely.
Richard Murphy argues that faster, simpler measures could raise far more.
His Taxing Wealth Report 2024 sets out reforms raising up to £90bn annually, including an investment income surcharge similar to National Insurance, which alone could vastly outperform a wealth tax - while also preparing for such a wealth tax if still needed.
2026 could be the year this blatant injustice is tackled, so Christmas 2026 is better for those who create wealth through work rather than those who use tricks to avoid tax on assets and hoard wealth. Murphy’s report is a clear roadmap, and I hope campaigners and political leaders align around it.