For fifty years the Davos Economic Forum has brought together world leaders and holders of the largest assets to analyze global problems. This time, inflation, the slowdown of the economy, the risk of artificial intelligence, the increase in social tensions, the war in Ukraine and the conflict between Israel and Palestine, warming and climate disasters.
As has happened in recent years, proposals also emerge outside the agenda and even against the spirit of the summit. This is the case of a group of over 250 businessmen and billionaires He states this in a letter published in the last few hours They asked to pay more taxes because they were “extremely” rich and therefore be able to reduce social inequality.
“Our demand is simple: we ask that we tax the richest in society; this will not radically change our standards of living, nor deprive our children, nor harm the economic growth of our nations. But it will make private wealth extreme and unproductive in an investment in our common democratic future”, they underline in their message.
This is the proposal “Proud to pay more” in Spanish) which they announced during the 54th edition of the Davos Forum. The idea is for politicians to introduce more taxes on wealth, an initiative that contrasts with Javier Milei’s questioning of taxes and Western leaders yesterday, who accused Switzerland of turning to “socialism” and asked them to “do not give in to the State”.
Rich signatories from 17 countries include the Disney heiress, Abigail Disney; Brian Cox, who played fictional billionaire Logan Roy in “Succession“; actor and screenwriter Simon Pegg; Valerie Rockefeller, heiress to the American dynasty; and Morris Pearl, former Blackrock executive. The list includes investors and philanthropists from the United States, England, Canada, Germany, Austria, Denmark and Greenland .
“We are also the people who benefit most from the status quo, but from inequality reached a turning point, and its cost to our economic, social and ecological stability is grave and increasing every day. In short, we must act now,” they say in the letter they attempted to deliver on Wednesday to world leaders gathered in Davos.
The curious campaign is promoted by “Tax Me Now” and “Patriotic Millionaires”, an organization founded in 2010 that rejected tax cuts for the wealthy by former U.S. President George W. Bush, promoted Tax Day in 2012 with former President Barack Obama, and promoted the signing of the bill to raise the salaries of federal civil servants in that country in 2014.
Now the organization has conducted a survey to analyze the thinking of 2,300 millionaires aged over 18, with a capital of more than one million dollars, within the G20. According to the results, 74% support increasing taxes on their wealth, 58% support introducing a 2% wealth tax. of people with assets over $10 million and 54% believe extreme wealth is a threat to democracy.
Argentina is also mentioned: in a box showing the percentage of population with more than $1 million in G20 countries, Argentina appears with 0.20%, above India and Indonesia, although below the rest.
The report cites an Oxfman article titled “Survival of the Richest” which estimates that for every dollar collected in taxes around the world, only four cents come from wealth taxes.
According to an Oxfam report published as part of the Davos forum, the five The world’s richest men have more than doubled their fortunes since 2020, rising from $405 billion to $869 billion in 2023.
Source: Clarin
