Bill Gates wants ultra-wealthy individuals to pay more tax — and now a growing chorus of billionaires agree.
In his annual “Ask Me Anything” forum on Reddit last year, the Microsoft cofounder said he was “surprised” that taxes for the rich haven’t been increased more.
Gates doubled down on his calls to tax the rich in a panel at the World Economic Forum in Davos this week. He said the wealthiest nations should donate more money to developing countries to help redress inequality.
“Those who have the most — whether it’s countries, companies, or individuals — should be pushed to be more generous,” he said.
It seems others agree, as more than 250 ultra-wealthy people signed an open letter calling for global leaders to impose a wealth tax.
Imagine if a wealthy individual, who believes that the wealthy should be taxed more, actually used their wealth to take out TV commercials in all states/provinces advocating for the increase in taxes for the wealthy, actually trying to sway the political mindset in a big way with the power they have via their wealth.
Easier to just release a statement. That way you can be the “good guy billionaire” without actually having to pay up.
the problem is they don’t want to sink their relative power.
Says the guy that fought tooth and nail for MRNA vaccination patents to remain private. Yeah pay taxes but maybe don’t make the money to begin with.
actions > words
I can’t find anything on Google that says anything about this. Can you sauce please?
TRIPS agreement waiver.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRIPS_Agreement_waiver
https://observer.com/2021/04/bill-gates-oppose-lifting-covid-vaccine-patent-interview/
I believe this is what they’re referring to.
I don’t believe shit they say, if they say “go ahead and tax me” it’s because they’ve got a way out so they won’t have to, somehow.
That “somehow” is called using credit to buy everything then setting your stocks as collateral, and since debt can’t be taxed well…
As it sits, yes, but ideally the wealth tax is based on asset valuation, not liquidity, which means that they would still be screwed. They are wealthy even if they carry enough debt to make it look like they are not on paper.
Dear Bill,
Would you be up for taxing charities owned by billionaires?
Sincerely yours
Charities are such an obvious money laundering scheme. “Philanthropy” my ass, it’s always tax evasion, all of this is just for the gallery.
Source: https://ips-dc.org/report-true-cost-of-billionaire-philanthropy/?mc_cid=bfa8894a28
The point of a charity is the wealth is no longer owned by the donor, and it has to be used for one of a few purposes in the public interest. Depending on how the charity is incorporated, I believe some have minimums they must pay out.
Regardless, really?
It’s really not that simple, and depends on such a ridiculous amount of variables. If you think these multibillionaires are giving away their money out of the kindness of their hearts you’re deluded.
Where there are many variables, one can always find ways to nudge things in the right ways so that you can get from point A to any other point B despite many other constraints put on your movements.
Ok.
subriemannian geometry
Transliterative or transcendent?
transversal
yes really, instances of abuse of charities by b/millionaires for tax evasion and money laundering are far too common (including transfer of donations back to the donor by indirect ways) https://www.oecd.org/tax/exchange-of-tax-information/42232037.pdf
Where there is a way to abuse something for tax evasion billionaires will find a way
But not him, he doesn’t have a lot of money. He donated all of it to charity which he is the founding member of and has an exclusive rights on using resources they have. Thus some money gets used yearly for charity, but significantly less than if it was taxed, the rest is kept for when he needs it. The most common way for rich to avoid taxation. So now every time you see some rich dude donating almost all of their wealth to charity… they are creating a banking institution without tax.
After he has already used a “charity” he created to tax shelter most of his money…
Oh, thank goodness the billionaires will save us from [checks notes] the billionaires.
Each multi billionaire espousing a higher tax on the wealthy is free to part with any portion of their riches as they desire. Haven’t seen even one actually following through. No one is hindering them. And certainly not our Government.
And that would open the door to paying an additional annual tax on your house, vehicles, stocks, etc. Make no mistake, this would be designed to go after the middle class, not the wealthy.
That’s not the point. A one-time donation is not the same thing as a tax. Governments need to plan and budget, random donations from rich people don’t work well for that. It would potentially cause programs to be started that cannot be sustained, etc.
Like many necessary changes, this needs to be a part of the system, not something these people just do out of the goodness of thier hearts. They benefit massively from capitalism, and they should be forced to share some of that with the masses that’s are currently struggling to survive.
Bill Gates should either shut his stupid fucking mouth or put his insanely exorbitant amount of money where that stupid fucking mouth is. Oh, he is a philanthropist and supports many causes and charities? No, he is an ultra wealthy individual who hordes his insane amount of wealth and has so much of it that he can casually drop seven plus figures in to any cause he wants, collect accolades from the public for it, and make that money back by the end of the fucking hour. Fuck bill gates
Not to mention he got a fake divorce from his wife for monetary purposes
Or that he wasnt even a struggling inventor like the stories have us believe, his mom was on the board for IBM ffs
I think he donated half his wealth and convinced other billionaires to do the same a few years back.
he makes money exponentially, that is meaningless to his total wealth
For every one of him, there are probably thousands of neuvo riche and wannabe rich who say otherwise. It’s an unfortunate truth.
The fox thinks that we need a stronger hen security doors installed and the weasels agree 👏
So does this mean a wealth tax that will actually hit the rich or simply increasing income taxes that will be avoided by the rich as usual?
You can voluntarily overpay taxes. Put your money where your mouth is Bill.
I don’t understand this comment. It’s some psuedo-leftist aggression. How can you pay extra taxes? Just not file and get a return? I have filed my own taxes for 20 years and never seen “do you want to pay more?” Other than contributing to the Presidental fund. The only thing I can come up with is not filing after already paying. That’s tax evasion.
Honestly, if you have the option, it’s a pretty simple choice - put it into a charity you know will help people or overpay taxes and watch the money be guzzled by the military.
Take that money and talk and fund progressive politicians so we’ll have systematic change.
This bullshit talk about paying more taxes is worthless.
Okay then like do it, if you want to pay more money to the government then just fucking give it to them instead of fucking around with this dumb letter saying, “oh we promise we care about the peasan… I mean poors… I mean the financially disadvantaged”
I can’t actually picture how easily someone would just send a larger check to the IRS - it’d probably be kicked back to you as a tax refund if you filled your taxes correctly.
Much easier would be to found your own charity to get similar effects done - which, surprise, Gates already does. And I’m sure he doesn’t just mean “I should be paying more taxes”, he means “Everyone as wealthy as me”, even if said other people don’t agree with him.
Don’t worry, the US Treasury has directions:
Well, I learned something new!
That said, I could certainly worry about the way sudden money like that would be spent. A lot of better government programs are supported by sustained funding, rather than the sudden effect of a billionaire waking up feeling charitable enough to send out a lump sum.
If billionaires really wanted higher taxes, they’d have higher taxes.
What they want is no taxes and to look like their hands are tied “I can’t possibly pay taxes they won’t take my money! It’s not my fault it’s the government. Damn them!”
While they spend millions of dollars a year lobbying to get their taxes reduced even further and passed on to the working class.
Have you considered how that would be done? How does one give extra money to the government? Should he just bank transfer Biden a few billion?
