The American economist Joseph Stiglitz proposes to introduce a special global tax rate of 70% for the highest earners, according to the British newspaper The Guardian.
In an Oxfam Equals podcast, the 2001 Nobel laureate in economics said such a move would “clearly make sense” to address inequality.
“The people at the top could work a little less if you tax them more. But, on the other hand, our society benefits from having a more egalitarian and cohesive society”, said the economist.
Currently, the highest rate of income tax in France is 45% on annual income above 168,994 euros. In the United Kingdom it is 45% on income over 150,000 pounds sterling (170,317 euros), and 37% on income over $495,305 in the United States, recalls The Guardian.
Two thirds of the wealth for the richest 1%
Joseph Stiglitz also said that he was in favor of introducing wealth taxes on the fortunes accumulated by the world’s richest. “A lot of wealth is inherited wealth,” he said.
He supports US Senator Elizabeth Warren’s proposals for a 2% tax for people with assets over $50 million and 3% for those with more than $1 billion. According to the US economist, these measures would “mitigate some of the problems” in the United States.
Last week, the NGO Oxfam published a report denouncing the “extreme concentration of wealth” and proposing to “abolish” billionaires. Of the $100 of wealth created, $54.4 has gone into the pockets of the top 1% in the last ten years, and 70 cents has gone to the bottom 50%, according to the NGO.
Among the measures proposed in this report, an exceptional tax on wealth, a tax on dividends and an increase in taxation on income from work and capital of the richest 1%.
Source: BFM TV
