AIBU to think a 2% wealth tax on the rich is unfair?

[Mrspepperpotpot]

i just saw an article and petition from oxfam saying if we taxed the ‘super rich’ 2% it would solve a lot of problems. They were suggesting 2% on anyone worth 10 million. Everyone in the comments agreed

I just don’t understand this mentality. High earners are hit at every turn. They usually use private health and private schools, pay the most tax, get hit with tax on savings, IHT, land tax, pensions etc etc Why on earth should people earn money to be taxed on it, to then be taxed on it again and again.

Why do people begrudge others having money when they’ve worked extremely hard to get it? Why isn’t there uproar about benefits instead?

I know this will never actually happen but the amount of people who seem to want it to is astonishing

assumptions based on fact, Martha Stewart as an example so how many more are there who didnt get caught

The charges stemmed from her December 2001 sale of nearly 4,000 shares in the biotechnology company ImClone Systems. Prosecutors proved she was tipped off by her Merrill Lynch stockbroker that ImClone's CEO was secretly selling his stock, and she subsequently lied to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the FBI about her reasons for selling.

Which links can you read? And why can’t you Google.

Facts like Martha Stewart did it but that's the only Google results I've currently got.

Let me know when you've got some actual data.

Where is this from?

The Guardian were reporting it today.

LOL

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/jul/21/uk-wealth-tax-super-rich-andy-burnham

Thanks will have a look later

thing is it will never happen full stop

About 12 with an EHCP, and 50/200 on the SEND register.

If you google US charity foundations, you’ll see why a lot of wealthy people set them up. It’s basically a bit of a tax dodge. Foundations donate to other foundations, there’s no capital gains tax, and you only have to donate 5% of the total per year. You can also pay yourself/friends/relatives huge salaries, plus pay for expenses. Not quite as philanthropic as you might think.

Where will that 20m+ go? It will keep growing and pass down the generations. I'm sure they wouldn't miss the 2% tax.

If you have 100 and invest it and get a 4 per cent return - you get 4 back per year. That is then taxed at 45per cent. Then if you have to hand over another 2 every year, that basically leaves you with nothing, in fact negative, if accounting for inflation.
Rich people do not stay back for “negative”.
You cannot start with 2 per cent, it is far too high given the 45% tax rate.
You are basically assuming a rich person can always make a near 8-10% return per year. Plenty of years that won’t be the case.
Rich people tend to be able to do basic maths.

You don’t pay income tax on the passive income that comes from investments, so the 45% doesn’t apply.

The wealth tax I’ve seen proposed is also expressed as a floor - ie 2% of total wealth, but if you are paying tax for other reasons (ie if you also have taxable income) then that would count towards the 2%. The aim is to ensure that the Effective Tax Rate they pay is similar to the rate being paid by ordinary high earners.

Of course you pay income tax on interest on bank accounts and dividends on shares etc etc! You pay it at your marginal income tax rate which for anyone rich will be 45% (unless it is in an ISA which has a limit of 20k per year, so for the rich that is never going to be enough).

According to AI the Spanish wealth tax only made about 2 billion and the Norwegian one is around 3 billion a year. These are not significant tax raisers for the economy and services - and the risk of deterrent into investment is large. It just does not work in practice.
And to tell anyone middle class that they think of themselves as rich when we are not. That is not the case, as mentioned many times, the middle class earners know when they put in shit deterring tax policies to satisfy the ideologues Robin Hood hunger, it is us that end up paying more to make up for the deterrent effect.

The investments favoured by the ultra wealthy are ones which focus on growth (i.e stocks that favour reinvesting earnings to boost share value, rather than ones that pay out dividends).

Because the spending of the ultra wealthy is dwarfed by the compounding growth of the millions they hold, the amount available to be taxed at Income Tax levels is only a very small part of the whole picture (unlike the rest of us relying on salaries that are entirely subject to Income Tax).

Even then, it is relatively straightforward to minimise their tax liability even further. They can use stock portfolios as collateral for low-interest loans - so spending is funded by debt rather than income (therefore not taxable).

So “passive income from investments” (as shorthand for the overall amount the wealth increases each year) is very high, but the taxable element of it is kept far smaller.

This is why their effective tax rates end up so much lower than than that of ordinary people (something which research on this consistently shows).

OK @Nesbi - but neither Spain nor Norway have managed to extract much out of their wealthy. And I assume checking it all is quite burdensome on their version of inland revenue.
Taxes only make sense if they raise substantial amounts. And taxing a few hundred or at best few thousand highly mobile people with tax advisers does not seem to yield much at all going by other countries.

There is also this proposed billionaire one off tax in California, subject to a vote:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jun/25/california-billionaire-tax-explainer

It is all rather baffling. If you said to most people with little wealth, you need to for emergency health and homelessness and defence in your immediate neighbourhood contribute 5% of what you genuinely don’t need (ie your luxury spend) - I reckon a lot of people would actually do it. But not the super wealthy. The super wealthy - it is more about power and insecurity etc and being in charge.

@Araminta1003 - I don’t think it is simple, but with sufficient motivation I also don’t think it is as impossible as some people seem to believe. It feels defeatist to just throw up our hands and accept that the ultra wealthy are effectively untouchable, and can’t be made subject to the rules that apply to us mere mortals.

I also think a sense of fair play, that according to the law we should all bear a share of the load according to our means, is important to a well functioning society. It feels about time that the focus shifted to the role that they play. While most of the country, and the government itself, gets poorer, they are living through a boom time, a wealth explosion. If we carry along this trajectory of wealth moving from us to them we will see most of society around us continue to get poorer.

Rather than the usual narrative of all our ills being blamed on the poorest and least powerful people in society, it is heartening to see the spotlight turn on the ultra wealthy for a change.

As they hoard more and more wealth against a backdrop of ordinary people’s lives become ever more precarious, perhaps people will at least recognise what is happening - ,even if ultimately we are powerless to stop it.

I actually met some of them and they seemed perfectly fine. The receptionists at our hotel. The live in maid we met in Dubai. All seemed to be doing perfectly fine.

Woman are treated super well and say how safe they feel. I felt so safe there compared to London.

That's remarkably naive of you. They live in a dictatorship, they aren't going to complain about it to some random person

I'm astounded by your naivety

I've never been to HK but it seems fine. Despite this tightening political grip, Hong Kong recently overtook Switzerland as the world’s largest cross-border wealth management hub.

I've only ever been to the UAE on holiday, I absolutely loved it. I know there are issues with exploitation but it's not everyone. Their working class, do work long hours but they do it diligently. They aren't claiming welfare (it doesn't exist) and stealing stuff.

The live in maid works for a family member of mine. I stayed there for a bit. She's perfectly fine. Sees her own family often, is paid and is seen as another member of the family.

the issue seems to be when workers are paid proper wages and there is a wage gap between general worker and management level
then when proper prices are paid for food and other products, and then all other services society needs

then after all that the whole country is bankrupt because the economic system is not suited and its based on wealth extraction for the creation of big mega projects rather than society as a whole not to mention all financed by debt

I posted above where you got your info on a French wealth tax that you implied had failed. 2 posts up you said :

My post - RedTagAlan · Yesterday 23:20
Do you have any links as evidence to your claim. Eg when, what were they, when scaled back, why.... and so on ?
Your post is suggestive that there was such a tax, but it failed in some way ?

Your reply - EasternStandard · Yesterday 23:21

Which links can you read? And why can’t you Google.

So you made a claim, and your reply to me asking where it came from was "google it". Then someone makes the near same claim as you did, and you ask that poster, " where is this from?"

Oh, I did look it up. And France do have a wealth tax, on property. I see nothing to say it failed, because they still charge it.