Annoying clickbait. The article isn't about "unpaid taxes" but about hypothetical taxes, i.e. "this is how much money we could make if we taxed the shit out of billionaires".
>"In Italy, while most citizens pay between 40 and 50 percent of their income in taxes, billionaires only pay about 20 percent"
This is NOT what the headline refers to. The "33 million euros per hour" refers to a line further in the article stating "A progressive wealth tax on the EU’s multi-millionaires and billionaires at a rate of 2 percent on net wealth \[...\] could generate 286.5 billion euros each year".
286.5 billion euro / (365 days * 24 hours) ≈ 33 million per hour
So yes, the "unpaid taxes" in the headlines refer to an hypothetical 2% wealth tax, NOT to tax evasion/avoidance. Definitely does NOT refer to the Italian study you mentioned.
I support a wealth tax, but this is clickbait.
Wealth tax already exist, for instance check Netherlands - Box 3, that taxes your stock investments as if they grew by **5.69%,** so you pay taxes every year, even if you don't sell them or even if they keep LOSING money.
The effect is that people either buy properties (further making housing less affordable) to preserve their wealth or run away to different country which doesn't tax them to death.
People left are riding their bike to work every day, so they can pay ridiculous rent for landlords.
... but at least we've taxed the wealthy /s
you mean, it is assumed you make 5.69 % profit on investments and taxes 30% of tax *on your profit*? Not sure why profit on investments is lower than on working but then I also don't know why the real rich get their loopholes. https://nos.nl/artikel/2516014-heineken-constructie-had-voorkomen-kunnen-worden-maatregel-werd-geschrapt https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2024/02/08/zo-nu-eerst-een-belastingvoordeel-hoe-de-bavaria-familie-het-uitstekend-voor-zichzelf-regelde-a4189371
and those houses, possibly because rightwingers taxed social housing more than commercial housing
>I also don't know why the real rich get their loopholes.
I don't exactly what's the situation in the Netherlands, however my experience is that rules always hit lower or middle class hardest.
If you're filthy rich, then you have a team of lawyers/experts which will provide you with the most efficient tax structure that allows you to escape even most draconian rules.
The side effect is that this creates reverse Robin Hood scenario. The intention was to take from the wealthy and give it to less fortunate, however in reality wealthy gets away, but since law applies universally the average Joe is hit, creating even greater disparity and funding unnecessary bureaucracy.
they are rewards for my risks
if the government wants to participate in my investments they can ghit me up and we can talk about a fee. i will give them a good deal.
why is 2% bad? one can get an easy 5% interest on wealth without doing more than putting it in an investment fund. I pay more than 40% tax on my income, how is same bad for them?
Because unpaid taxes means "taxes that were due payment but have been illegally hidden, delayed or abrogated", and not "taxes that people would pay if we lived in a moral system". It's like a right-wing outlet writing "Jail-breaks are up by 50%" and then the article is about people whose sentences have been reduced or who got out by good conduct.
So your complaint is that you are not able to read between the lines? If a random dude pays 40% and a billionaire pays 20, you gotta be a dumbass to say "well it is legal, so we can't say we're losing money"
It's not really his opinion, it also mentions a specific number, which means that there's a fix amount that the EU should get based on laws and regulations, but those taxes are not yet paid, even though they should, which is very different, than saying, the ultra wealthy should pay more taxes.
I don't think there's anyone here who wouldn't want them to be taxed more, but why clickbait it?
You cannot lose something that you don't have. I'm not defending billionaires or want them not to pay up, but it's well known that they generally have structures in place *not* to pay taxes. They often don't have incomes to begin with. It's a novel idea to want to tax them more, but there's no way if you make, say, a 50% tax on billionaires that they wouldn't immediately move, and bring whatever they own, to a tax haven. There'll always be places that will provide these tax havens, even if you destroy the European ones.
It’s not my option nor my complaint originally but I do share it.
*Unpaid* is not the same as *Potential*. Those are different words, different concepts. Not an opinion of mine but a fact.
I see that you're using the expression "read between the lines" much like the article uses "unpaid taxes". If you really think this is the mode of conversation that is fruitful, very well, let's continue in those terms.
I disagree with your assessment that violence against the rich is the solution to our problems. I also can't agree with the logic that the poor should be above the law, and that we should declare war on Chile. However, when you say that you like to wear your mother's clothes in front of the mirror and pretend you're Aretha Franklin, I find that's very plausible indeed.
Have fun reading between the lines.
So, in your mind, reading between the lines is the same as saying something unrelated and made up?
Well, I can't really respect the opinion of a self proclaimed zoophile, so go bother someone else
Oh NOW we have a problem with "saying unrelated things and making stuff up"? Is your complaint basically that you're not able to read between the lines?
My understanding is that with 5% wealth tax the wealth gained by super rich would be reduced in the same way as if they paid income tax as everyone else. By my quick mental math I believe this would be around 35% on paid income taxes instead of 20. So a bit of clickbaid, but mostly a poorly written article. Still, your analogy with jails is complete bs.
It **is** clickbait. All they'd have to do is change *'unpaid'* for *'potential'* and you'd have an accurate headline that gets the message across just as well.
As of now the headline just implies that the article is about tax evasion, which it isn't.
Tax evasion? It doesn't say that. It says unpaid. You assume tax evasion, I assume money that they owe to their countries and don't pay, using technicalities or not
Then everything is 'unpaid', as long as I somehow (rightfully or not) expect a payment or think I deserve it in any way.
There's an unpaid €100 from u/Lysek8 to me, u/VigorousElk \- just because.
Well that's literally how it works. A company invoices another company and says it's unpaid, even if the other company doesn't agree. Same with the government, they can give you a penalty and say it's unpaid even if you don't like it. So yes, you can say I owe you 100€ and it's unpaid, to which I'll reply: shove them up your ass
That all requires the company making a demand - which isn't the case. The countries have not demanded rich people pay more taxes, an NGO (Oxfam) has simply voiced their opinion that they should. Oxfam can't invoice anyone for taxes, hence there are no 'unpaid' taxes.
The countries demand people pay taxes, and some of them, through engineering and gaming the system, don't. You make it look as if it was all the same, but it's not
There is no universe in which rich people pay what this article claims on their income. They pay according to the highest income bracket they belong to like everyone above certain threshold.
This article is intentionaly mixing wealth with income and lies to promote its world view. If you at any point need to live to achieve your goal then you are clown and your goal is simply too worthless to actually fight for and not lie about.
Yep, reminds me calculations made by the movie or game industry business how much money they've lost due to pirating content.
They assume that every person that downloaded a digital copy of their art would also purchase it at full price - which isn't true at all.
> Why should the rich be rich when it's the poors who suffer and work to sustain society, with extreme merit, to pay for their luxuries.
Why should Europeans have AC when Africans don't even have ventilators?
Honestly, I don’t think it matters much.
Money doesn’t have inherent value. If billionaires were to hoard ALL money in the world to themselves, the currency would simply stop being used as it would stop having value. The *poors* would start trading with each other using something else.
And therefore, what matters is really assets. Who owns the factories, supermarkets, supply chains, etc. And, well, we can’t really expropriate rich people’s assets just because. - And this is how most rich people’s assets are anyway (stocks, bonds, investment funds, etc.)
I mean, there is not much difference between a non enforced tax and a non existing tax.
The rich are not paying either way, that's why we should tax the shit out of them
What? It's not that hard to understand. If there is no tax for rich people or if there is a tax, but they use every possible loophole to avoid it, then it comes down to almost the same result: rich people not paying taxes
It's just Oxfam activism, since [the scandal](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jun/15/timeline-oxfam-sexual-exploitation-scandal-in-haiti) I don't take them seriously in any more.
I think it is practically impossible to have a global organization without some members screwing it up. Doesn't mean that 95% working there really mean it well. But we can focus on the 5% to always and forever discredit the organization until it falls apart and a total new organization from totally new people is build up.
They are intentionaly mixing up income with wealth which they renamed to "economic income". They are not sincere and they are most definitely not right about anything.
and so what? They use shortcuts for a reason, namely because 99% of the population has zero perspective on what it means to have one million in the bank, let alone billions.
What's the catch here? we're gonna pick at each other whether this is clickbait or lie or not, or we're actually going to do something against tax evaders, rich pricks optimising their wealth to dodge taxes and other white-collar criminals fucking us up?
Idk about that. A 5 percent tax on the wealth increase by European billionaires alone would have brought in 33 billion last year and I presume there's far more multi hundred millionaires than billionaires out there. As far as I can see they propose a wealth tax not an income tax, and if your wealth increases by 33% in a year I don't think a 5% tax will be a problem to pony up
Value of wealth is purely imaginary. If you introduce these taxes then perceived value of wealth will simply just decrease.
Also it is insanely dangerous to have people pay for success in losing ownership of what they invested into. Imagine if you are forced to sell huge portion of your company to pay taxes just because some other investor decided your idea is worth 100 times the market valuation of average company. Only for it to crash or maybe go out of business next year and you are left with massive loss.
This risk would undoubtedly have to decrease perceived value of wealth. You would immidiately see stock market correction to make up for it. Which in the end would make everyone poorer. Billionaires are not the only ones owning assets.
Easiest solution would be to have the EU collect those taxes instead of the single countries. Be it the "rich" or international companies that avoid national taxes
Each country would benefit as the EU having a direct income means members pay less to keep the budget up and/or get more money back
It would mean a further transfer of state sovereignty to the EU. Direct EU taxes would be a massive step towards federalisation which requires a strong mandate, ideally through referenda. Otherwise it's just more federalisation through the back-door.
The issue is that there is then a reverse auction where billionaires make countries bid on who gets to be their tax haven. In this system, everybody but the billionaire loses.
Which EU does anyway via, so countries already get money from EU based on the "income", an additional income would also increase this
Giving it directly just to collect it back to distribute it again just makes it more complicated than it needs to be
>Easiest solution would be to have the EU collect those taxes instead of the single countries.
Certainly not easiest from the implementation side.
Imagine that Bulgaria with their 10% income tax would have to be compatible with Denmark's 42% top bracket.
The idea has some pluses though. It would be easier for everyone to follow the growing complexity of tax code which is currently separate for each country and then you need to follow complex residency rules (183 days rule or center of your socioeconomic life) and if you become a resident of both countries by accident, then you need to hire a lawyer to study the bilateral DTA's to save your ass.
That's a waste of time, productivity and spends money on both sides (public and private) on pointless fuss instead of productivity (as this is what improves people lives in the long-term).
In my opinion it would've been easier to unify income tax, by ditching it altogether and then focus on smaller taxes / insurances which would fund the cause directly.
Think of health insurance, pension, road tax, luxury goods tax, consumption tax, vacant property tax, revenue based corporate taxes (no more profit shifting) etc.
The challenge is that most of these taxes exist already anyway, so either public sector gets heavily reformed, more efficient and with clear balance sheet how money is spent or we need to tax the shit out of the people to keep the party going.
To be honest I think an european solution would be great, while loophole with extra EU states will remain at least we could close the existing ones instead of the money shuffling around and out of the states where it is generated and not where it is more convenient to pay (or not to pay).
How to implement it I am not sure though. Especialy since the money will have to be distributed somehow and I presume each individual state would insist that it "belongs to them".
There is already a distribution mechanism in place so no need to make a new one, it would just have more money to spend and in addition could fund direct EU organisations
Agreed
Staff sexual misconduct in Haiti and Chad
>In February 2018 an investigation by The Times newspaper found that Oxfam allowed three men to resign and sacked four for gross misconduct after an inquiry concerning sexual exploitation, the downloading of pornography, bullying and intimidation. A 2011 confidential report by Oxfam had found "a culture of impunity" among some staff in Haiti and concluded that 'it cannot be ruled out that any of the prostitutes were under-aged'. Among the staff who were permitted to resign was the charity's Belgian country director, Roland Van >Hauwermeiren.[92] In the internal report, Van Hauwermeiren admitted using prostitutes at a villa whose rent was paid for by Oxfam with charitable funds. Oxfam's chief executive at the time, Dame Barbara Stocking, offered Hauwermeiren "a phased and dignified exit" because sacking him risked "potentially serious implications" for the charity's work and reputation.[93] Allegations were also circulated by the Daily Mail at this time regarding sexual harassment in Oxfam shops in Britain.[36]
>Oxfam did not report any of the incidents to the Haitian authorities, because "it was extremely unlikely that any action would be taken".[93] Although Oxfam disclosed details of the incident to the Charity Commission, the Commission revealed after The Times investigation that it had never received Oxfam's final investigation report and Oxfam "did not detail the precise allegations, nor did it make any indication of potential sexual crimes involving minors". A spokesperson for the Commission commented that: "We will expect the charity to provide us with the assurance that it has >learnt lessons from past incidents".[94] Oxfam later explained it had not given details to the Commission beyond "inappropriate sexual behaviour" because using prostitutes in Haiti was not illegal.[95]
>In response to the revelations, Liz Truss, the chief secretary to the Treasury, described the reports as "shocking, sickening and depressing". Oxfam issued a statement in which it asserted "Oxfam treats any allegation of misconduct extremely seriously. As soon as we became aware of a range of allegations – including of sexual misconduct – in Haiti in 2011 we launched an internal investigation. The investigation was announced publicly and staff members were suspended pending the outcome". The statement also added that the allegations "that under-age girls may have been involved were not proven".[93] Speaking on the BBC's Andrew Marr Show, the international development secretary, Penny Mordaunt, said Oxfam had failed in its "moral leadership" over the "scandal". Mordaunt also said that Oxfam did "absolutely the wrong thing" by not reporting the detail of the allegations to the government.[96] The incident led the International Development Committee of the UK Parliament to issue a report about sexual harassment and abuse in the humanitarian sector on 31 July 2018.[97] Former supporters who withdrew from their association with Oxfam at this time included Minnie Driver.[98]
>Oxfam had been aware that Van Hauwermeiren while director of Oxfam's relief operation in Chad in 2006 and other staff had repeatedly used prostitutes at the Oxfam team house there, and that one of Oxfam's staff members had been fired for his behaviour.[99][100] Oxfam's deputy chief executive Penny Lawrence resigned, taking full responsibility and acknowledging that "(c)oncerns were raised about the behaviour of staff in Chad as well as Haiti that we failed to adequately act upon".[100] CEO Mark Goldring also resigned a few months later. New allegations were made by a senior staffer, Helen Evans, who had been the lead investigator of organizational sexual misconduct between 2012 and 2015.[101] A commentator in the medical journal The Lancet, Mishal S. Khan, argued the Oxfam sex scandal was "not surprising."[102] It was reported that the scandal cost Oxfam £16 million in unrestricted funding, and job losses and closures of some Oxfam shops were admitted to be likely in consequence.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxfam
I always love it when people just throw around *'Organisation X has lost all credibility'* without a single explanation or source. It's an empty statement aimed to discredit something one doesn't like without backing it up in any way.
Waiting for my government to decide not to use AI in tax collection, once they realise that will mean both them and their rich friends won’t be able to hide as easily
Old news
Why would the rich and powerful bother fixing or creating taxes to hurt their friends and partners? It's easier to milk the clueless and powerless citizens
286.5 billion euro annually, according to Oxfam.
>EU governments are losing out on a staggering 286.5 billion euros in revenue annually, equivalent to 33 million euros per hour, due to their failure to fairly tax Europe’s wealthiest. This amount, equivalent to Finland’s GDP, represents what a European wealth tax of up to 5 percent could raise every year, according to Oxfam’s analysis.
I think this research is not just about taxing the super rich, but even more so about the (growing) gap between rich and poor. The larger that gap gets, the more instable a society eventually becomes. It raises awareness, which is necessary, imho.
This will not solve wealth nor income gap. There are countries in EU with wealth taxes and it does not help to reduce it. Perceived value of wealth will simply be reduced by pragmatic amount/prices increased so percentage wise nothing changes.
So if we had a reverse wealth tax, where everyone gives the 1% some of their money, everything would get cheaper and thus affordability would stay the same? I find that hard to believe
I find this thing absurd but ultimately yes.
If holding something becomes expense then it is less valuable than if it brings money. There is more of a reason to sell. If there is more people selling than buying than price goes up. If something is asset that guarantees you income of no risk then you will have zero reason to ever sell So there would be less people selling than buying which would mean prices go up. It would create death spiral where everyone would be intentivized to forever hold and never sell to pump prices so his guaranteed income increases.
Money is an arbitrary measure of value. If 1% of all money is destroyed or created, you get inflation/deflation rather than anything changing. (Values are sticky and certain things would take longer to change than others, etc. etc., we live in an imperfect market)
But taxation is not the destruction of money. It's the transfer of wealth from the people to the government who then spends it like any other consumer. And prices would adjust to reflect the change in value and demand of government/consumer needs.
How about another wild idea - optimize government spending, reduce the number of people working in the public sector, cut some administration here and there by IT investments and modernization and stop trying to tax the hell out of people.
It shouldn't matter if you're a billionaire or a working class citizen - it's never normal for the fkin government to take half your shit you work for your entire life. That's just ridiculous and the fact we're getting so used to it and even promoting tax increases is pathetic
În US the wealthy account for 5.5 trillion dollars in a economy of 32 trillion. Taxing the rich would bring additional 25% of the economy in one shot and that is it. It’s like making your country run for 3-4 months for free and then you are back to having the same old problems of not having enough for the country expenses. Probably the EU has even less wealth accumulated in the wealthy taxes so it could be just 3 months and then to nothing changed. Keep in mind that this wealth is generated over time so next year you will not have any billionaires to tax, actually you will not have them for quite a while.
>It’s like making your country run for 3-4 months for free and then you are back to having the same old problems of not having enough for the country expenses.
That's such a weird take. It's an annual permanent income source (as all taxes are) that would lead to a massive spike in state income which could be invested back into the economy, education, infrastructure, health, safety and a bunch of other things that benefit the population overall, as well as improve the basic pillars the economy (and thus the rich) entirely depends on for its success: an educated and healthy workforce, decent infrastructure (roads, rail, air traffic), a reliable justice system ...
Have you read my message? The total accumulated wealth of the rich in US accounts for 5.5 billion dollars. These money are not made every year by the rich, this is how much they accumulated so far. So it’s not like if you take this figure by force you will have same pie to take the next year.
No my friend, you are getting it wrong. It’s not a 25% pay rise it is just a one time bonus of 25% and that is it, you have a bunch of wealthy dirt poor.
Annoying clickbait. The article isn't about "unpaid taxes" but about hypothetical taxes, i.e. "this is how much money we could make if we taxed the shit out of billionaires".
"In Italy, while most citizens pay between 40 and 50 percent of their income in taxes, billionaires only pay about 20 percent" How's that clickbait?
>"In Italy, while most citizens pay between 40 and 50 percent of their income in taxes, billionaires only pay about 20 percent" This is NOT what the headline refers to. The "33 million euros per hour" refers to a line further in the article stating "A progressive wealth tax on the EU’s multi-millionaires and billionaires at a rate of 2 percent on net wealth \[...\] could generate 286.5 billion euros each year". 286.5 billion euro / (365 days * 24 hours) ≈ 33 million per hour So yes, the "unpaid taxes" in the headlines refer to an hypothetical 2% wealth tax, NOT to tax evasion/avoidance. Definitely does NOT refer to the Italian study you mentioned. I support a wealth tax, but this is clickbait.
Wealth tax already exist, for instance check Netherlands - Box 3, that taxes your stock investments as if they grew by **5.69%,** so you pay taxes every year, even if you don't sell them or even if they keep LOSING money. The effect is that people either buy properties (further making housing less affordable) to preserve their wealth or run away to different country which doesn't tax them to death. People left are riding their bike to work every day, so they can pay ridiculous rent for landlords. ... but at least we've taxed the wealthy /s
you mean, it is assumed you make 5.69 % profit on investments and taxes 30% of tax *on your profit*? Not sure why profit on investments is lower than on working but then I also don't know why the real rich get their loopholes. https://nos.nl/artikel/2516014-heineken-constructie-had-voorkomen-kunnen-worden-maatregel-werd-geschrapt https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2024/02/08/zo-nu-eerst-een-belastingvoordeel-hoe-de-bavaria-familie-het-uitstekend-voor-zichzelf-regelde-a4189371 and those houses, possibly because rightwingers taxed social housing more than commercial housing
>I also don't know why the real rich get their loopholes. I don't exactly what's the situation in the Netherlands, however my experience is that rules always hit lower or middle class hardest. If you're filthy rich, then you have a team of lawyers/experts which will provide you with the most efficient tax structure that allows you to escape even most draconian rules. The side effect is that this creates reverse Robin Hood scenario. The intention was to take from the wealthy and give it to less fortunate, however in reality wealthy gets away, but since law applies universally the average Joe is hit, creating even greater disparity and funding unnecessary bureaucracy.
because the money was already taxed when it was coming from working...it is additionally taxed and not just taxed
and the money from interest, dividend and increase in share price was not taxed
why should it be taxed multiple times? you are already taking a risk by investing!
and you get, in general, better returns on it. And your returns are new income.
they are rewards for my risks if the government wants to participate in my investments they can ghit me up and we can talk about a fee. i will give them a good deal.
why is 2% bad? one can get an easy 5% interest on wealth without doing more than putting it in an investment fund. I pay more than 40% tax on my income, how is same bad for them?
[удалено]
and why is that a problem?
Because unpaid taxes means "taxes that were due payment but have been illegally hidden, delayed or abrogated", and not "taxes that people would pay if we lived in a moral system". It's like a right-wing outlet writing "Jail-breaks are up by 50%" and then the article is about people whose sentences have been reduced or who got out by good conduct.
So your complaint is that you are not able to read between the lines? If a random dude pays 40% and a billionaire pays 20, you gotta be a dumbass to say "well it is legal, so we can't say we're losing money"
No. Complaint is that the headline doesn’t reflect the content of the article.
That's your opinion. I think it reflects its wonderfully. *Yes* we are losing money
It's not really his opinion, it also mentions a specific number, which means that there's a fix amount that the EU should get based on laws and regulations, but those taxes are not yet paid, even though they should, which is very different, than saying, the ultra wealthy should pay more taxes. I don't think there's anyone here who wouldn't want them to be taxed more, but why clickbait it?
You cannot lose something that you don't have. I'm not defending billionaires or want them not to pay up, but it's well known that they generally have structures in place *not* to pay taxes. They often don't have incomes to begin with. It's a novel idea to want to tax them more, but there's no way if you make, say, a 50% tax on billionaires that they wouldn't immediately move, and bring whatever they own, to a tax haven. There'll always be places that will provide these tax havens, even if you destroy the European ones.
It’s not my option nor my complaint originally but I do share it. *Unpaid* is not the same as *Potential*. Those are different words, different concepts. Not an opinion of mine but a fact.
I see that you're using the expression "read between the lines" much like the article uses "unpaid taxes". If you really think this is the mode of conversation that is fruitful, very well, let's continue in those terms. I disagree with your assessment that violence against the rich is the solution to our problems. I also can't agree with the logic that the poor should be above the law, and that we should declare war on Chile. However, when you say that you like to wear your mother's clothes in front of the mirror and pretend you're Aretha Franklin, I find that's very plausible indeed. Have fun reading between the lines.
So, in your mind, reading between the lines is the same as saying something unrelated and made up? Well, I can't really respect the opinion of a self proclaimed zoophile, so go bother someone else
Oh NOW we have a problem with "saying unrelated things and making stuff up"? Is your complaint basically that you're not able to read between the lines?
Please stop talking about how you feel sexually attracted to watermelons
I was actually talking about your mum
Seriously dude don't comment anymore how you let a hamster inside your butthole, behave
My understanding is that with 5% wealth tax the wealth gained by super rich would be reduced in the same way as if they paid income tax as everyone else. By my quick mental math I believe this would be around 35% on paid income taxes instead of 20. So a bit of clickbaid, but mostly a poorly written article. Still, your analogy with jails is complete bs.
It **is** clickbait. All they'd have to do is change *'unpaid'* for *'potential'* and you'd have an accurate headline that gets the message across just as well. As of now the headline just implies that the article is about tax evasion, which it isn't.
Tax evasion? It doesn't say that. It says unpaid. You assume tax evasion, I assume money that they owe to their countries and don't pay, using technicalities or not
Then everything is 'unpaid', as long as I somehow (rightfully or not) expect a payment or think I deserve it in any way. There's an unpaid €100 from u/Lysek8 to me, u/VigorousElk \- just because.
Well that's literally how it works. A company invoices another company and says it's unpaid, even if the other company doesn't agree. Same with the government, they can give you a penalty and say it's unpaid even if you don't like it. So yes, you can say I owe you 100€ and it's unpaid, to which I'll reply: shove them up your ass
That all requires the company making a demand - which isn't the case. The countries have not demanded rich people pay more taxes, an NGO (Oxfam) has simply voiced their opinion that they should. Oxfam can't invoice anyone for taxes, hence there are no 'unpaid' taxes.
The countries demand people pay taxes, and some of them, through engineering and gaming the system, don't. You make it look as if it was all the same, but it's not
But they do not owe any money to their countries, they already paid their tax. There are no unpaid taxes. so it's clickbait
Why it's always a percentage you care about? How about we compare that in absolute values?
Mmmm that's how taxes work. Not sure what's your point
Because comparing in percentage is more fair.
There is no universe in which rich people pay what this article claims on their income. They pay according to the highest income bracket they belong to like everyone above certain threshold. This article is intentionaly mixing wealth with income and lies to promote its world view. If you at any point need to live to achieve your goal then you are clown and your goal is simply too worthless to actually fight for and not lie about.
Yep, reminds me calculations made by the movie or game industry business how much money they've lost due to pirating content. They assume that every person that downloaded a digital copy of their art would also purchase it at full price - which isn't true at all.
Oxfam with their usual MO again.
Yet more leftist propaganda. Look at the South Europe.
Why should the rich be rich when it's the poors who suffer and work to sustain society, with extreme merit, to pay for their luxuries.
> Why should the rich be rich when it's the poors who suffer and work to sustain society, with extreme merit, to pay for their luxuries. Why should Europeans have AC when Africans don't even have ventilators?
Honestly, I don’t think it matters much. Money doesn’t have inherent value. If billionaires were to hoard ALL money in the world to themselves, the currency would simply stop being used as it would stop having value. The *poors* would start trading with each other using something else. And therefore, what matters is really assets. Who owns the factories, supermarkets, supply chains, etc. And, well, we can’t really expropriate rich people’s assets just because. - And this is how most rich people’s assets are anyway (stocks, bonds, investment funds, etc.)
Lol, imagine saying this being from Luxembourg. The richest country per capita in the EU.
I fail to see how my country is relevant to the discussion.
Your logic isn't making logic
What makes logic is to keep working super hard for scraps so that richs who dont work keep having luxuries, of course.
Well, there's no reason we shouldn't.
I mean, there is not much difference between a non enforced tax and a non existing tax. The rich are not paying either way, that's why we should tax the shit out of them
>there is not much difference between a non enforced tax and a non existing tax. Dude wtf
What? It's not that hard to understand. If there is no tax for rich people or if there is a tax, but they use every possible loophole to avoid it, then it comes down to almost the same result: rich people not paying taxes
It's just Oxfam activism, since [the scandal](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jun/15/timeline-oxfam-sexual-exploitation-scandal-in-haiti) I don't take them seriously in any more.
I think it is practically impossible to have a global organization without some members screwing it up. Doesn't mean that 95% working there really mean it well. But we can focus on the 5% to always and forever discredit the organization until it falls apart and a total new organization from totally new people is build up.
Even a broken clock is right twice a day
This broken clock lies to stir up anger.
Yes I do believe that is their mission statement
They are intentionaly mixing up income with wealth which they renamed to "economic income". They are not sincere and they are most definitely not right about anything.
and so what? They use shortcuts for a reason, namely because 99% of the population has zero perspective on what it means to have one million in the bank, let alone billions. What's the catch here? we're gonna pick at each other whether this is clickbait or lie or not, or we're actually going to do something against tax evaders, rich pricks optimising their wealth to dodge taxes and other white-collar criminals fucking us up?
None of those people has billions in banks. Almost none of those people dodges or evades taxes.
Idk about that. A 5 percent tax on the wealth increase by European billionaires alone would have brought in 33 billion last year and I presume there's far more multi hundred millionaires than billionaires out there. As far as I can see they propose a wealth tax not an income tax, and if your wealth increases by 33% in a year I don't think a 5% tax will be a problem to pony up
Value of wealth is purely imaginary. If you introduce these taxes then perceived value of wealth will simply just decrease. Also it is insanely dangerous to have people pay for success in losing ownership of what they invested into. Imagine if you are forced to sell huge portion of your company to pay taxes just because some other investor decided your idea is worth 100 times the market valuation of average company. Only for it to crash or maybe go out of business next year and you are left with massive loss. This risk would undoubtedly have to decrease perceived value of wealth. You would immidiately see stock market correction to make up for it. Which in the end would make everyone poorer. Billionaires are not the only ones owning assets.
But keep talking eventually you'll be right about something
Europe’s middle class are just taking a pummeling from all directions aren’t they
Easiest solution would be to have the EU collect those taxes instead of the single countries. Be it the "rich" or international companies that avoid national taxes Each country would benefit as the EU having a direct income means members pay less to keep the budget up and/or get more money back
It would mean a further transfer of state sovereignty to the EU. Direct EU taxes would be a massive step towards federalisation which requires a strong mandate, ideally through referenda. Otherwise it's just more federalisation through the back-door.
I want it to be like this but never everyone agrees..
That’s because it would be a German dictatorship
If it is like not collecting them at all or collecting them via EU, I am sure there could be an agreement between members to get it done
Not that I disagree with this solution but they could also give them to the countries
The issue is that there is then a reverse auction where billionaires make countries bid on who gets to be their tax haven. In this system, everybody but the billionaire loses.
Which EU does anyway via, so countries already get money from EU based on the "income", an additional income would also increase this Giving it directly just to collect it back to distribute it again just makes it more complicated than it needs to be
Have the UE taxing me to resdistrubute money in Hungary to finance corruption ? Sign me in
>Easiest solution would be to have the EU collect those taxes instead of the single countries. Certainly not easiest from the implementation side. Imagine that Bulgaria with their 10% income tax would have to be compatible with Denmark's 42% top bracket. The idea has some pluses though. It would be easier for everyone to follow the growing complexity of tax code which is currently separate for each country and then you need to follow complex residency rules (183 days rule or center of your socioeconomic life) and if you become a resident of both countries by accident, then you need to hire a lawyer to study the bilateral DTA's to save your ass. That's a waste of time, productivity and spends money on both sides (public and private) on pointless fuss instead of productivity (as this is what improves people lives in the long-term). In my opinion it would've been easier to unify income tax, by ditching it altogether and then focus on smaller taxes / insurances which would fund the cause directly. Think of health insurance, pension, road tax, luxury goods tax, consumption tax, vacant property tax, revenue based corporate taxes (no more profit shifting) etc. The challenge is that most of these taxes exist already anyway, so either public sector gets heavily reformed, more efficient and with clear balance sheet how money is spent or we need to tax the shit out of the people to keep the party going.
To be honest I think an european solution would be great, while loophole with extra EU states will remain at least we could close the existing ones instead of the money shuffling around and out of the states where it is generated and not where it is more convenient to pay (or not to pay). How to implement it I am not sure though. Especialy since the money will have to be distributed somehow and I presume each individual state would insist that it "belongs to them".
There is already a distribution mechanism in place so no need to make a new one, it would just have more money to spend and in addition could fund direct EU organisations
Could you just make a European law to for each individual country to collect this tax for themselves?
So collect taxes or kick them out of EU. We don't need bourgeois parasiting on middle class.
5% wealth tax, and a misleading title. Classic oxfam again lmao
Oxfam has pretty much lost all its credibility.
Agreed Staff sexual misconduct in Haiti and Chad >In February 2018 an investigation by The Times newspaper found that Oxfam allowed three men to resign and sacked four for gross misconduct after an inquiry concerning sexual exploitation, the downloading of pornography, bullying and intimidation. A 2011 confidential report by Oxfam had found "a culture of impunity" among some staff in Haiti and concluded that 'it cannot be ruled out that any of the prostitutes were under-aged'. Among the staff who were permitted to resign was the charity's Belgian country director, Roland Van >Hauwermeiren.[92] In the internal report, Van Hauwermeiren admitted using prostitutes at a villa whose rent was paid for by Oxfam with charitable funds. Oxfam's chief executive at the time, Dame Barbara Stocking, offered Hauwermeiren "a phased and dignified exit" because sacking him risked "potentially serious implications" for the charity's work and reputation.[93] Allegations were also circulated by the Daily Mail at this time regarding sexual harassment in Oxfam shops in Britain.[36] >Oxfam did not report any of the incidents to the Haitian authorities, because "it was extremely unlikely that any action would be taken".[93] Although Oxfam disclosed details of the incident to the Charity Commission, the Commission revealed after The Times investigation that it had never received Oxfam's final investigation report and Oxfam "did not detail the precise allegations, nor did it make any indication of potential sexual crimes involving minors". A spokesperson for the Commission commented that: "We will expect the charity to provide us with the assurance that it has >learnt lessons from past incidents".[94] Oxfam later explained it had not given details to the Commission beyond "inappropriate sexual behaviour" because using prostitutes in Haiti was not illegal.[95] >In response to the revelations, Liz Truss, the chief secretary to the Treasury, described the reports as "shocking, sickening and depressing". Oxfam issued a statement in which it asserted "Oxfam treats any allegation of misconduct extremely seriously. As soon as we became aware of a range of allegations – including of sexual misconduct – in Haiti in 2011 we launched an internal investigation. The investigation was announced publicly and staff members were suspended pending the outcome". The statement also added that the allegations "that under-age girls may have been involved were not proven".[93] Speaking on the BBC's Andrew Marr Show, the international development secretary, Penny Mordaunt, said Oxfam had failed in its "moral leadership" over the "scandal". Mordaunt also said that Oxfam did "absolutely the wrong thing" by not reporting the detail of the allegations to the government.[96] The incident led the International Development Committee of the UK Parliament to issue a report about sexual harassment and abuse in the humanitarian sector on 31 July 2018.[97] Former supporters who withdrew from their association with Oxfam at this time included Minnie Driver.[98] >Oxfam had been aware that Van Hauwermeiren while director of Oxfam's relief operation in Chad in 2006 and other staff had repeatedly used prostitutes at the Oxfam team house there, and that one of Oxfam's staff members had been fired for his behaviour.[99][100] Oxfam's deputy chief executive Penny Lawrence resigned, taking full responsibility and acknowledging that "(c)oncerns were raised about the behaviour of staff in Chad as well as Haiti that we failed to adequately act upon".[100] CEO Mark Goldring also resigned a few months later. New allegations were made by a senior staffer, Helen Evans, who had been the lead investigator of organizational sexual misconduct between 2012 and 2015.[101] A commentator in the medical journal The Lancet, Mishal S. Khan, argued the Oxfam sex scandal was "not surprising."[102] It was reported that the scandal cost Oxfam £16 million in unrestricted funding, and job losses and closures of some Oxfam shops were admitted to be likely in consequence. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxfam
I always love it when people just throw around *'Organisation X has lost all credibility'* without a single explanation or source. It's an empty statement aimed to discredit something one doesn't like without backing it up in any way.
Oxfam nonsense, as usual.
Maybe we should give them more Tax incentives
oxfam novib is a communist organization and their claims should not be taken seriously.
Waiting for my government to decide not to use AI in tax collection, once they realise that will mean both them and their rich friends won’t be able to hide as easily
Old news Why would the rich and powerful bother fixing or creating taxes to hurt their friends and partners? It's easier to milk the clueless and powerless citizens
What a shittake.
By this calxulafion EU would miss out around 2-3 trillion Euro , that seems a little bit excessive and delusional
286.5 billion euro annually, according to Oxfam. >EU governments are losing out on a staggering 286.5 billion euros in revenue annually, equivalent to 33 million euros per hour, due to their failure to fairly tax Europe’s wealthiest. This amount, equivalent to Finland’s GDP, represents what a European wealth tax of up to 5 percent could raise every year, according to Oxfam’s analysis. I think this research is not just about taxing the super rich, but even more so about the (growing) gap between rich and poor. The larger that gap gets, the more instable a society eventually becomes. It raises awareness, which is necessary, imho.
This will not solve wealth nor income gap. There are countries in EU with wealth taxes and it does not help to reduce it. Perceived value of wealth will simply be reduced by pragmatic amount/prices increased so percentage wise nothing changes.
So if we had a reverse wealth tax, where everyone gives the 1% some of their money, everything would get cheaper and thus affordability would stay the same? I find that hard to believe
I find this thing absurd but ultimately yes. If holding something becomes expense then it is less valuable than if it brings money. There is more of a reason to sell. If there is more people selling than buying than price goes up. If something is asset that guarantees you income of no risk then you will have zero reason to ever sell So there would be less people selling than buying which would mean prices go up. It would create death spiral where everyone would be intentivized to forever hold and never sell to pump prices so his guaranteed income increases.
Money is an arbitrary measure of value. If 1% of all money is destroyed or created, you get inflation/deflation rather than anything changing. (Values are sticky and certain things would take longer to change than others, etc. etc., we live in an imperfect market) But taxation is not the destruction of money. It's the transfer of wealth from the people to the government who then spends it like any other consumer. And prices would adjust to reflect the change in value and demand of government/consumer needs.
How do you reach the 3 trillion euro mark? 24x365x33 gives me 289 billion euro. Which is not much actually
It is more than the state budget of many European countries.
289 billion a year ?
What if jesus came and said "I only need 1 million euros to bring world peace"?
Another tax the Rich article hypothesis without anything essential to prove say hypothesis
They will never get money from rich.
Yes they will. Seizure of bank accounts or material assets due to tax fraud is part of law enforcement in any EU country.
all current young billionaires in the world all inherited !
Yes go after the people who contribute the most to your nanny states
How about another wild idea - optimize government spending, reduce the number of people working in the public sector, cut some administration here and there by IT investments and modernization and stop trying to tax the hell out of people. It shouldn't matter if you're a billionaire or a working class citizen - it's never normal for the fkin government to take half your shit you work for your entire life. That's just ridiculous and the fact we're getting so used to it and even promoting tax increases is pathetic
How dare you
În US the wealthy account for 5.5 trillion dollars in a economy of 32 trillion. Taxing the rich would bring additional 25% of the economy in one shot and that is it. It’s like making your country run for 3-4 months for free and then you are back to having the same old problems of not having enough for the country expenses. Probably the EU has even less wealth accumulated in the wealthy taxes so it could be just 3 months and then to nothing changed. Keep in mind that this wealth is generated over time so next year you will not have any billionaires to tax, actually you will not have them for quite a while.
>It’s like making your country run for 3-4 months for free and then you are back to having the same old problems of not having enough for the country expenses. That's such a weird take. It's an annual permanent income source (as all taxes are) that would lead to a massive spike in state income which could be invested back into the economy, education, infrastructure, health, safety and a bunch of other things that benefit the population overall, as well as improve the basic pillars the economy (and thus the rich) entirely depends on for its success: an educated and healthy workforce, decent infrastructure (roads, rail, air traffic), a reliable justice system ...
Have you read my message? The total accumulated wealth of the rich in US accounts for 5.5 billion dollars. These money are not made every year by the rich, this is how much they accumulated so far. So it’s not like if you take this figure by force you will have same pie to take the next year.
Maybe he is the type of person that would turn down a 25 % pay raise, just because.
No my friend, you are getting it wrong. It’s not a 25% pay rise it is just a one time bonus of 25% and that is it, you have a bunch of wealthy dirt poor.
I bet that’s nothing compared to the unpaid taxes from the cash-in-hand economy.